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THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

AND THE PART PLAYED BY ORGANIZED MEDICINE 



THE 
EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

AND THE PART PLAYED BY ORGANIZED MEDICINE 



by 
CHARLES TABER STOUT 



NEW YORK 

MITCHELL KENNERLEY 

MCMXXI 

M 



COPYRIGHT 192 1 BY 
MITCHELL KENNERLEY ^ 



J 

MAR 30 1922 






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PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES 

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©CI.A661074 ^ 



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PREFACE 

The first pages of this book were included in a 
paper written as a protest against the candidacy of 
a regular Army officer who was seeking the nom- 
ination of one of the great parties for the office of 
President of the United States. This general officer 
had entered the Army through the medical branch 
of the service and still maintained his membership 
in the medical organization, which expected to avail 
itself of his Administration (if that ever became a 
reality) to push its special legislative programme. 
Ten days after the protest referred to reached its 
destination, together with the protests of others, 
an inquiry as to the source of the candidate's cam- 
paign fund was begun in the Senate. That investi- 
gation ended his presidential aspirations. 

With this inception, the book has been continued 
and completed in order to draw public attention to 
a question of national concern — the real meaning of 
the prohibition movement, and its relations to Or- 
ganized Medicine and other interests. Under the 
guise of altruism, a grave injustice has been imposed 
upon a free people by a relatively small number of 
zealots and profiteers. It seems important, there- 
fore, that the public should know the facts. 

C. T. S. 



INTRODUCTION 

Like many others, I used to look upon prohibition 
as a dream of the idealist. It was a dream with 
which I was not particularly concerned. My ideas 
on the whole subject were rather vague, like the ideas 
of most people on most subjects of importance; but 
I believed in a general way that the removal of in- 
toxicating liquors from ordinary use would be a good 
thing for the country. The harm which alcohol had 
done and was doing was quite obvious. Like others, 
I had seen lives ruined by over-indulgence and homes 
broken up. I had drawn what seemed natural con- 
clusions from casual observation and reflection. But 
when I began to give the question serious considera- 
tion, I had to admit that I really knew nothing about 
prohibition, good or bad. I had certain impres- 
sions, which might be justifiable or otherwise. That 
was all; and it was not enough. 

I began to read some of the literature on the 
subject. One of the first books which came to my 
attention was Dr. Eugene Lyman Fisk's "Alcohol 
— Its Relation to Human Efficiency and Longevity." 
Many of his statements conflicted with the opinions 



viii INTRODUCTION 

I had formed in the loose way just described. The 
book, however, was persuasive, and I read it through 
a second time. After this second perusal I became 
skeptical; and I then read it once more, critically, 
checking up the various statements, with the result 
that I had to discard many of them as worthless. 
I do not mean to question Dr. Fisk's sincerity, of 
course; but apparently, as in the case of so many 
of our scientists, his field of observation has been 
distinctly limited. The impression which I received 
from the book was that if the prohibitionists were 
obliged to resort to propaganda such as this, there 
must be something wrong with their cause. 

I went over the matter with others. They became 
interested, and we traced some of the propaganda 
down to its sources. What had been at first merely 
curious inquiry soon developed into an absorbing 
study, not only of the theories of the prohibitionists, 
but also of the forces behind the movement. The 
moral plea on which prohibition was originally put 
forward had now been subordinated to the question 
of health. The American Medical Association had 
joined the ranks of the anti-alcoholists and had 
passed a resolution condemning alcohol both as a 
food and a medicine. We followed the activities 
of the association through its various channels of 
influence. The trail led from one of the great medi- 
cal institutions to another, until it finally brought up 



INTRODUCTION ix 

in the medical departments of the national gov- 
ernment. 

The aged fisherman of the Arabian Nights could 
not have been more astonished when he removed the 
seal of Solomon from the mouth of the jar which his 
net had brought to the surface, and saw the genie 
issue forth, than we were at the result of our in- 
vestigations. We found a giant organization oc- 
cupying the centre of the stage. Torn by factions 
within, pressed on all sides by virile foes without, 
it was turning and twisting, grasping at any weapon 
which would preserve its life for even a short time 
longer. It was medievalism struggling against the 
advance of civilization. We found, indeed, more 
than the power behind prohibition itself; we found 
the reason why disease has been able to flourish in 
spite of all that science has accomplished for its 
control. We found men of international reputation 
in the world of medicine prostituting their profes- 
sion, and forgetting their personal honor, to main- 
tain an organization which has long outlived its 
usefulness and which has no place in a civilized 
community in a modern age. 

There is but one excuse for prohibition, and that 
is ignorance. Is the ignorance displayed by our 
medical authorities on the subject of alcohol real 
or assumed? Do they sincerely believe, or merely 
pretend to believe, that prohibition will mean an 



x INTRODUCTION 

improvement in the health of the people? The 
question is on a par with another one which has 
been asked rather frequently: Did the Inquisitors 
of the Middle Ages believe that the rack and the 
fagot would advance the cause of truth, or did a 
certain proportion of them, at least, employ these 
unpleasant arguments mainly to further their own 
interests and protect their special organization? 

Some light on the first question, at any rate, should 
be found in the ensuing pages. 






CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

INTRODUCTION vii 

I THE ISSUE 9 

II THE MORAL PLEA FAILS 13 

III THE HEALTH PLEA 17 

IV ORGANIZED MEDICINE 22 
V THE SERUM CONTROVERSY 3 o 

VI A NEW FACTOR 35 

VII THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CHEMOTHERAPY 41 

VIII A PROFITABLE PARTNERSHIP 46 

IX THE OTHER PARTNERS 50 

X SOME PROHIBITION PROPAGANDA 59 

XI ALCOHOL AND LONGEVITY 69 

XII MORE FALLACIOUS PROPAGANDA 75 

XIII THE LABORATORY vs. NATURE 84 

XIV THE FOOD VALUE OF ALCOHOL 97 
XV ALCOHOL AS A MEDICINE 104 

XVI ALCOHOL AND FATIGUE 113 

XVII FATIGUE AND DISEASE 123 

XVIII THE ECONOMIC SIDE OF PROHIBITION 130 

XIX THE LAW AND PERSONAL LIBERTY I49 

XX THE LABOR UNION 159 

XXI ENFORCEMENT 167 

XXII GOVERNMENT BY PROPAGANDA? 187 

XXIII THE WAY OUT 192 

XXIV CONCLUSION 206 
INDEX 213 



THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

AND THE PART PLAYED BY ORGANIZED MEDICINE 



For John the Baptist came neither eating 
bread nor drinking wine; and ye say, He hath 
a devil. 

The Son of Man is come eating and drink- 
ing; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, 
and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and 
sinners. 

St. Luke, vii : 33, 34. 



THE 
EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

CHAPTER I , . 

THE ISSUE 

America has embarked upon a great experiment, 
the elimination of alcoholic beverages from her na- 
tional diet. The fact that wine has had its recog- 
nized place in the human economy from time im- 
memorial seemed a matter of small consequence to 
the theorists who championed the prohibition move- 
ment. There were certain manifest evils con- 
nected with alcohol, therefore alcohol must go. 
And alcohol has gone, to a large extent. True, it 
still lingers in the homes of the rich and the provi- 
dent; poisonous substitutes are being purveyed at 
fantastic prices by bootleggers, saloon keepers and 
other profiteers ; and the home-brewer is warming to 
his work and gradually learning the secrets of suc- 
cess. But the old order has certainly changed, 
yielding place to new. Is the new, however, better 
than the old, or is it fundamentally vicious? 

9 



io THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Whenever we interfere with natural laws or es- 
tablished custom, trouble is to be expected; and 
whether expected or not, it will come. It is safer 
to build our houses, and even our ultra-modern 
skyscrapers, from the foundation upward rather 
than from the skyline downward; or the downward 
will be very clearly accentuated. But in these days 
of unrest, "try anything once" seems to have become 
the maxim of the advanced thinkers who would guide 
mankind to the great visionary higher level. 

There has never been a time in the history of the 
world when the theorist was more in evidence. The 
wonderful progress seen everywhere in the arts and 
sciences during the present generation has encour- 
aged theoretical speculation. The hypotheses of 
yesterday are the inventions and discoveries of to- 
day, by which the earth, the sea, the air have been 
brought under man's dominion. Success has bred 
a carelessness, even a contempt, for nature's laws, 
until we now find those who are willing to believe 
that the very laws of life itself can be disregarded. 
At the risk of platitude, it is just as well to state a 
simple truism: It is not by ignoring natural laws 
that man has triumphed, but by understanding them ; 
not by denying, but by observing them. 

The shallow theorist, the bigot or the misguided 
moralist may become a source of serious danger to 
a community. There is no more perilous element 



THE ISSUE n 

in society than the fanatics who really believe in 
their fallacies, unless it be those who are willing 
to exploit their false doctrines for profit. "Uplift" 
is being used more and more frequently to disguise 
personal interest. It is time that people should be- 
gin to think for themselves, for they are being ex- 
ploited in a way which has become a menace to popu- 
lar government. With the spread of education, or 
rather the ability to read and write, the dissemina- 
tion of false doctrines has become increasingly easy. 
The prohibition movement offers one of the most 
conspicuous examples. 

The fate of the Eighteenth Amendment in the 
Supreme Court cannot be allowed to end the contro- 
versy. There is more than a legal principle in- 
volved: there is the vital question whether a nation 
can defy the laws of nature and still maintain its 
economic position. And with this there are the con- 
nected issues, the health, happiness and freedom of 
action of the American people. 

It must be remembered that the Supreme Court 
can only pass upon a case as presented. Unfortu- 
nately the real issue, the interest of the public in 
(and so intimately depending upon) the question, 
has never had a hearing. It has been a character- 
istic feature of the prohibition propaganda to pre- 
sent the controversy in a misleading aspect, and to 
make it appear a conflict between temperance on 



12 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

the one side and the liquor interests on the other. 
A careful consideration of the subject from the eco- 
nomic standpoint is not desired. Any attempt to 
turn on the light has been met by the Anti-Saloon 
League — the stalking horse of the real interests be- 
hind the movement — by raising the bugaboo of the 
liquor trade. The liquor traffic as it once was, and 
the true and continuing relation of alcohol to the 
human system, are two very different things. 

The public's interest in the case can be simply 
stated, and it is doubtful whether any court — except 
the final court of appeal of the whole people — has 
the power, or is competent, to pass on the question : 
Is alcohol necessary either as a food or a medicine 
for our individual or national well-being? 



CHAPTER II 

THE MORAL PLEA FAILS 

There are two aspects from which prohibition 
may be considered : the physical side, its effect on the 
health of the nation, or as Dr. Fisk phrases it, "its 
relation to human efficiency and longevity"; and 
the ethical side, its influence on national morals. 
After all, our morals are in a way but a higher sani- 
tary code, for we have been put on this earth pre- 
sumably to do appropriate work — God's work, in 
no canting sense — and moral guidance is to the end 
that we shall be fit in mind and body to carry on 
this work and assist our neighbors in the perform- 
ance of their share, to the mutual welfare of all. 

The morals, as commonly understood, of the 
Western nations are rooted in the law of Moses 
and the teachings of Christ. The miracles, sacra- 
ments and revelations of the Christian and Jewish 
religions alike are opposed to prohibition. It is 
difficult to see how any moral ground can be as- 
serted for this fetich unless we are ready to dis- 
card the clear guidance of both the Old and New 
Testaments. Nothing could be plainer than Christ's 
acceptance of wine in the institution of the Blessed 

13 



i 4 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Sacrament, the miracle at Cana of Galilee, and his 
teaching in the city called Nain. The Christian re- 
ligion preaches temperance, not prohibition. There 
is no Christian virtue, nor any other kind of virtue, 
in a self-denial that is enforced by a prison cell or 
moral straitjacket. If the Church had had the 
disposal of the immense sum by which prohibition 
was purchased, were there not vital purposes in ac- 
cordance (not at variance) with Christ's teaching, 
for which the money could have been well spent? Is 
total abstinence so paramount that the Church is 
willing to subordinate everything else for this one 
aim, — or are we now practising evangelism inten- 
sively, virtue by virtue ? 

The law of Moses is accepted by both the Chris- 
tian and the Jew as essentially the revelation of God. 
It has an important bearing on the subject not only 
morally, but physically also. There may be some 
who doubt the divine origin of the Hebrew laws, 
but they cannot question the historical fact that under 
these laws the people rose from a condition of 
slavery to the glory of a great nation under Solomon. 

For four hundred and thirty years the Israelites 
had lived in Egypt. Generation after generation 
had been born in slavery, the burdens of their Egyp- 
tian taskmasters pressing harder and harder upon 
the subject race. Everything possible was done to 
break their spirit, even to the murder of their male 



THE MORAL PLEA FAILS 15 

children. Moses was called upon to lead his rescued 
people to the Land of Promise and take possession 
of a country already inhabited by warlike tribes. 
A long period of preparation was necessary to fit 
the wanderers for their task. During the pilgrim- 
age a new generation was born free from the demor- 
alizing influence of slavery, and trained under laws 
of morality and health which have become the foun- 
dation of our civilization. 

The law of Moses deals distinctly with the use 
of alcohol, in the form of wine. In the directions 
for the harvest it divided the product of the vine- 
yard in the same manner that the grain of the field 
was apportioned. The first share was for a drink 
offering to the Lord. After that came the share 
of the owner of the vineyard. The third share was 
reserved for the poor as a necessary food. There 
is no hesitation or hypocrisy here. Wine is dedi- 
cated both to the glory of God and to the natural 
use of all the people. 

So much, briefly, for the religious aspect of the 
question. The prohibitionists cannot base any legit- 
imate arguments on the Christian or Mosaic dis- 
pensations. 

Alcohol is a food in the broad sense, because un- 
der certain conditions it may be essential for the 
proper nourishment of the body. The alcoholic 
craving has its foundation in normal requirements. 



1 6 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

This, together with the fact that alcohol is a free 
gift of nature, will make it impossible to suppress 
its use by prohibitory laws. The passage of the 
Eighteenth Amendment has not changed the human 
system: it has merely put back the cause of tem- 
perance a hundred and fifty years. Anyone can 
make alcohol. Indeed, in many of the products of 
the kitchen, where sugars and acids are combined, 
the housewife must exercise the greatest care to 
avoid making it. The American people had become 
accustomed to buying their alcoholic beverages ready 
made. The manufacture was in the hands of a very 
small percentage of the population and so was easily 
regulated. The Eighteenth Amendment has changed 
all this. America is fast becoming an. immense 
brewery. The relation between supply and demand 
is not a matter of fiat, but of fact. The substitu- 
tion, however, of tyros for experts in brewing and 
distilling, and of compulsory stealth for natural free- 
dom, can scarcely be considered an improvement. 
Still, experience teaches; the novice becomes an 
adept, even under unpleasant conditions. There will 
be more and better illicit alcohol as time goes by. 

The use of alcohol may be regulated, but not 
prohibited. So far from improving the morals of 
the people, prohibition will only increase hypocrisy 
and graft. There is not much doubt about this, for 
it has already happened. 



CHAPTER III 

THE HEALTH PLEA 

Prohibition failed as a moral issue because the 
two great American religions were traditionally op- 
posed to it. Something new had to be tried, and the 
success of the dry movement in certain Southern 
states offered a suggestion. Prohibition had made 
headway there because it was distinctly to the ad- 
vantage of the South to remove temptation from the 
negro race. Self-interest is a powerful entering 
wedge for any argument, and the leaders of the dry 
campaign began a survey of the country in an effort 
to find interests which coincided with their own and 
which they could utilize. 

Of course, the soft drink manufacturers were not 
overlooked. But while they might prove helpful 
from the financial standpoint later on, they were 
unorganized and of little influence in the country, 
and the selfish viewpoint would be altogether too 
obvious. However, three great and thoroughly 
systematized interests were found in receptive mood : 
the American Medical Association, the Life Insur- 
ance Companies, and the Standard Oil Company. 

17 



1 8 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

There were also certain other large corporations 
whose efficiency experts had been able to show that 
alcohol was increasing the cost of labor. 

The American Medical Association maintained 
the most powerful trained lobby in the country. As 
far back as 1907 the association had an agent in 
each of the 2,830 counties of the United States, 
and its list of approachable political leaders num- 
bered 16,000. Its interest was so distinctly on the 
side of prohibition that it has become the great 
power behind the movement. The financial backing 
of the other organizations was naturally of great 
importance. In addition, the life insurance com- 
panies were able to furnish valuable statistics, and 
the private charities of the Rockefellers offered a 
convenient cloak. How much the latter were in- 
fluenced by their relations with Organized Medicine 
it is impossible to say. But the plea of health and 
human efficiency was given the premier position in 
the propaganda for prohibition. 

In enlisting medicine in their cause the dry party 
acquired one of the most powerful agencies in our 
modern life, the influence of the family physician. 
In many a home in America this is a greater con- 
tinuous force than any other. There are many 
stories to illustrate the doctor's prestige, but one will 
suffice. 

Tucked away in the hills of New England is a 



THE HEALTH PLEA 19 

little village, the summer home of two intimate 
friends. As boys they had left this same village to 
make their way in the world beyond. They had been 
schoolmates together, and later on attended the 
same college. They were both interested in the same 
sports and pursuits, and the boyish friendship grew 
and ripened with the years. One of them took up 
the study of medicine; the other went into business 
and afterwards married. In the course of events a 
child was born, and who more fitting to attend at 
that critical period than the friend whom the father 
had learned to trust since boyhood? Other chil- 
dren came, and the physician, then a rising prac- 
titioner, cared for them through the illnesses of 
childhood, and the children learned to trust their 
father's friend. And finally there came a time when 
the doctor was called upon to share in the family's 
affliction. The wife and mother, through an un- 
fortunate accident, was injured beyond the curative 
power of any physician. But day and night he 
watched at her bedside, alleviating pain wherever 
possible and giving the immeasurable comfort of his 
presence and skill. If anything could add to that 
household's love and respect, it was his sympathy 
with their loss, his comprehension of their grief. 

You may wonder, perhaps, as to the precise ap- 
plication of this episode. It is given here because 



20 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

it is typical, not merely individual; because there 
are thousands of similar cases throughout America. 
Think of what that must mean; the enormous influ- 
ence exerted by such physicians amongst the mem- 
bers of innumerable families. And this influence, 
in itself so natural and splendid, is being exploited 
in a partisan cause and for special and specious in- 
terests. The general practitioner himself has not 
much choice in the matter. It is difficult for him to 
oppose for any length of time the settled policy of 
his professional organization. It is almost impos- 
sible for him to remain in the association and defy 
its crushing disciplinary powers, open and covert. 
He can try to do so, of course, if he chooses. Others 
have sometimes made the attempt, — and sometimes 
regretted it. As an alternative, the practitioner may 
resign his membership in the association and be- 
come an "outlaw." But that involves a new profes- 
sional outlook, the severance of old ties, the up- 
rooting of fixed habits, and an absolutely fresh start. 
Besides, he has still to face the resentment of the or- 
ganization, which does not readily forget; and there 
is no efficient outlaw organization to which he can 
turn for protection. It is not surprising, then, that 
the harassed practitioner, when he differs from the 
views of the authorities, should decide to feign an 
acquiescence that he does not feel. Only the prom- 



THE HEALTH PLEA 21 

inent and pushing — the leaders of cliques and fac- 
tions — have the privilege of self-assertion in medical 
circles. The rank and file have to be content with 
obedience, or the black list. 



CHAPTER IV 

ORGANIZED MEDICINE 

To understand the recent opposition of Or- 
ganized Medicine to alcohol, it will be necessary 
to trace the development of this great power through 
its earlier stages, describing in some detail the vari- 
ous incidents and influences which have led up to 
the present situation. Many of them are extremely 
instructive. 

Beginning in a small way, in the meetings of the 
town and county medical societies for the discussion 
of scientific matters or social betterment, a huge 
organization has been built up. Gradually, the 
agents of this organization have obtained positions 
of importance in the various institutions and estab- 
lishments concerned with the national health, until 
finally they have taken over the complete control of 
our medical departments, both state and federal. 

Before the days of Pasteur the science of medicine 
was little more than a mosaic of superstition. The 
physician had learned to recognize certain diseases 
and often obtained definite results in treatment, but 
the causes of disease, its progress and the reactions 

22 



ORGANIZED MEDICINE 23 

of the body, were obscured. Of all the applied sci- 
ences, medicine was the most backward. With the 
discovery of germ life, and its relation to pathogeny, 
a new era commenced. One after another, the or- 
ganisms which are the cause of our various diseases 
were isolated. And this knowledge was closely 
followed by the discovery of the curative forces, of 
the body itself. A wonderful and supremely im- 
portant field of research was opening before the 
eyes of the scientific world. 

No one can take even a casual glance into the 
maze of serum therapy without being impressed by 
its intricacies and the tremendous amount of labor 
necessary for its exploration. Especially is this true 
of the body's own curative forces. Little by little, 
and only after the most painstaking research, was 
the knowledge of these forces obtained, one truth, 
found after years of study and experiment, leading 
on to another until finally nature's marvellous mech- 
anism was revealed in its entirety. 

This work was accomplished by the scientists of 
Europe. The names of Pasteur, Metchnikoff, Bor- 
det, Ehrlich, Behring, Pfeiffer, Wright and Douglas, 
will always be associated with the great achieve- 
ment. The fact that America, though leading the 
world in other lines of effort through the inventive 
genius of her scientists and mechanicians, neverthe- 
less played so inconsiderable a part in medical de- 



24 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

velopment was due to the code of ethics originally 
foisted upon American practitioners by their Euro- 
pean brethren. Well-meaning in principle, this code 
was fatal in practice. It was found depressing even 
in the environment of its birth. Here, it was im- 
possible. 

The economic situation was an important factor. 
America was then in the midst of a tremendous in- 
dustrial boom. The great corporations were offer- 
ing large financial inducements for the best brains 
that the country could produce. The natural law 
of supply and demand will apply whether the com- 
modity is the brains of a scientist or a sack of pota- 
toes. The medical code required — and still re- 
quires — that any discovery or invention for the more 
effective treatment of disease should be given to the 
world for its free use. It is this old world theory, 
denying the right of the skilled practitioner to the 
product of his labor, which has done more than any- 
thing else to retard the advance of medicine in the 
United States. Deprived of its legitimate rewards 
in the medical field, genius was inevitably diverted 
into other channels. There was too much competi- 
tion for it to remain where it would only stultify 
itself. The laborer is worthy of his hire, and for 
priceless labor it seems rather ironic to receive no 
price at all. 

I have recently had an opportunity of discussing 



ORGANIZED MEDICINE 25 

this question with a bacteriologist of international 
reputation. In explaining his point of view he told 
the following story. When Behring perfected his 
antitoxin for diphtheria, he attempted to patent 
it. He was prevented from doing so because his 
colleagues did not think, in view of the work which 
others had done and by which he had profited, that 
he alone should reap the reward; for although they 
had failed, his success was built upon foundations 
which they had established. If a reward was to be 
given it should be distributed among all (or on be- 
half of all), living or dead, who had contributed to 
his final triumph. That may seem to some a counsel 
of perfection; to me it seems simply a plea of in- 
eptitude. Our civilization would be in a curious 
state if the creators of our steam engines and auto- 
mobiles had been denied patents, because someone 
in a prehistoric age had used the wheel on the ox- 
cart; or if perfecting the open-hearth furnace had 
brought no reward from the steel industry because 
some antediluvian ancestor had employed fire in 
broiling a steak. 

As a result of the success of the foreign investi- 
gators, the practising physician became dependent 
upon Europe for his medical knowledge. It must 
be remembered that during this period the science 
of medicine was making tremendous strides. More 
was being accomplished than in all the years since 



26 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Hippocrates. Our institutions were kept busy test- 
ing the theories of the European schools and passing 
them on to the practitioners. These institutions 
of research thus became clearing houses and dis- 
tributing points for the new medical facts, and the 
control of medicine centered in the hands of the few 
who were able to speak with authority. With such 
a foundation it was a comparatively easy matter to 
build up a political machine whose power has never 
been exceeded, unless by the religious organizations 
of the Middle Ages. 

And then occurred the very thing which the code 
of medical ethics was intended to prevent — the com- 
mercializing of medical knowledge. Our medical 
authorities embarked upon the manufacture of the 
newly discovered biological products, some openly, 
others sub rosa through the medium of their more 
venturesome associates. And although many of 
these vaccines and serums proved complete failures, 
they were marketed in large quantities. 

With the completion of their organization, one of 
the first movements undertaken by the medical ring 
was a campaign against the patent medicines. 
There had grown up in the country a great business, 
the manufacture of nostrums. Some of these were 
utterly worthless, others contained drugs which any- 
one could procure from the corner pharmacy. They 
were prepared in fancy packages, under high-sound- 



ORGANIZED MEDICINE 27 

ing titles, and sold to the credulous and unwary. 
They had already been condemned by the practising 
physician because in many instances the beneficial 
effect was at best illusory, while they were often defi- 
nitely detrimental either through harmful ingredients 
or through the ignorance and improper use of the 
buyers — "addicts" as many of them could justly 
be called, for the patent medicine habit has a tend- 
ency to become chronic. The campaign against these 
nostrums unquestionably strengthened the hands of 
the medical authorities, both with the sensible por- 
tion of the lay public and with the general body 
of practitioners, who naturally did not wish to see 
their lawful practices thus cut into, to their own loss 
and the manifest danger of their patients. 

The campaign was conducted along two lines, the 
education of the public and the passage of inhibitory 
legislation. The association leaders attempted to 
stop self-medication by making it necessary for the 
layman to obtain a doctor's prescription before he 
could purchase even the simplest form of drug. 
Failing in this, they tried to force the publication 
of the formulas of all proprietaries. The neces- 
sary legislation was pushed in every state and in 
Congress; the bills are part of our legislative rec- 
ords. In this campaign we see the first leaning of 
Organized Medicine towards prohibition. Speak- 
ing before a meeting of the Women's Christian Tern- 



28 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

perance Union at Nashville, Tennessee, the spokes- 
man of the American Medical Association said: 
"The average drug-store in the United States is little 
more than a saloon for the sale of disguised alcohol 
and 'dope' under the pretence of patent medicines." 

The drive against the proprietary preparations 
had a very important though unforeseen effect, and 
the American practising physician became the chief 
sufferer. The campaign was conducted on such 
broad lines that not only was it directed against the 
fake nostrum, but even the legitimate proprietary 
was attacked. Improvement in drugs was thus dis- 
couraged and the physician had to look for his medi- 
cines to the countries, particularly Germany, whose 
laws encouraged pharmaceutical chemistry. 

This was not the only result. The propaganda 
against drugs was pushed so vigorously that it be- 
gan to create a doubt in the minds of the public 
as to the value of drugs in the treatment of dis- 
ease. This idea was supported for financial reasons 
by the manufacturers of the various biological prod- 
ucts, who were aided by their partners in official 
positions. As a consequence the regular school of 
medicine, which had relied on drugs from time im- 
memorial, suddenly found itself confronted by a new 
and virile cult, the school of drugless medicine. 
How serious a menace this has become to the pres- 
tige of the regular practitioner is shown by the fact 



ORGANIZED MEDICINE 29 

that these "physicians of health" — the osteopath, 
the chiropractor, the dietician — are now able to 
claim that their clients number twenty-eight millions. 

It must not be supposed that the regular physi- 
cians were satisfied to see their patients slip away 
from them. There was much criticism, even ridi- 
cule, of their leaders, and in some instances open 
rebellion. But in the majority of cases the practi- 
tioner decided that it was politic to retain his mem- 
bership in the association. However, it began to 
dawn upon him that some of the medical authorities 
were lining their pockets at his expense. 

In all this, serum therapy played an important 
part. 



CHAPTER V 

THE SERUM CONTROVERSY 

When we consider that for centuries man had 
been groping in vain for the causes of disease, it is 
easy to account for the strong appeal of the new 
science. After it was discovered that a small amount 
of serum derived from a horse which had been 
inoculated with the diphtheria bacillus would pro- 
tect a human being against the specific toxin of the 
disease, it was thought that within a short time suc- 
cessful preparations would be secured from the 
germs of other diseases. We now know that there 
is great variety in pathogenic organisms and that 
many of them do not yield to serum therapy. 
Nevertheless, certain definite results had been 
achieved and our medical authorities were able to 
obtain support for their work in government appro- 
priations and large contributions from private in- 
dividuals. In addition, valuable publicity was se- 
cured from the press of the country. With this 
support, it was a comparatively easy matter to per- 
suade the practitioner to accept serum therapy. 

But it soon became evident that the authorities had 

30 



THE SERUM CONTROVERSY 31 

been over-sanguine and that serum therapy was far 
from accomplishing all that had been hoped for. 
The failure reacted against its advocates and opened 
a point of attack for the osteopath and chiropractor, 
which they were not slow to use to advantage. It 
is quite possible that the newer medical schools 
would have been content to "live and let live." They 
had received some recognition from the regular prac- 
titioners, who occasionally called in their assistance. 
But Organized Medicine, jealous of its control, un- 
dertook a campaign against them, hoping to limit 
their practice by legislation. In some of the states 
this was actually accomplished; and so the newer 
schools felt compelled to retaliate. The following, 
taken from Dr. Alma C. Arnold's "The Triangle 
of Health," will serve as an example of their 
methods : 

"Infantile Paralysis and Vaccination: Do you 
know that infantile paralysis often follows vac- 
cination? (See report by James A. Loyster of 
investigations of 54 cases of illness and death 
from vaccination in New York State during 19 14, 
and statistics.) 

"Do you know that investigation of the epi- 
demics of 1907 and 19 1 6 produced strong evi- 
dence that they were started from vaccine virus? 
(See New York Herald for September 28, 19 16.) 



32 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

"Do you know that the United States Govern- 
ment proved that the epidemics of foot and 
mouth disease, which swept this country in 1902-3 
and 1908-14, were started from vaccine virus? 
(See Bureau of Animal Industry, Circular No. 
147, and Farmers' Bulletin No. 666.) 

"Do you know that hundreds of United States 
soldiers on the Texas border have suffered from 
paratyphoid fever caused by typhoid vaccination? 
(See newspapers and Army Reports.) 

"Do you know that the cases of typhoid fever 
among the Spanish- American war soldiers in 1898 
(before the discovery of typhoid vaccine) 
amounted to 8.8 per cent.? (See U. S. Army Re- 
ports.) 

"Do you know that when the 14th Regiment 
N. Y. N. G., U. S., arrived at Camp Whitman 
from the Texas border, the cases of paratyphoid, 
together with the healthy active carriers, 
amounted to 17 per cent. — double that of 1898? 
(See N. Y. Health Department Reports.) 

"Do you know that paratyphoid fever is human 
hog-cholera? (Appleton's Medical Dictionary, 
January, 19 16, defines it: 'Paratyphoid — resem- 
bling typhoid fever or the typhoid bacillus. Par- 
atyphoid bacillus — an organism belonging to the 
hog-cholera group, which causes paratyphoid 
fever.') 



THE SERUM CONTROVERSY 33 

"Do you know that nearly 70,000 British sol- 
diers (all vaccinated for typhoid immunity) 
were sent home from the Gallipoli Peninsula 
with tuberculosis, and as a result compulsory vac- 
cination has been abolished in England? (See re- 
port of speeches in the House of Commons.) 

"Do you know that New York City statistics 
show that cancer has increased there fully 225 
per cent, since 1870? (See Board of Health Re- 
port.) 

"Do you know that cancer and tuberculosis 
are traced by specialists to blood debasement from 
vaccination? (See writings of Sir Robert Bell, 
f° r 43 years cancer specialist in London; and 
many others.) 

"Do you know that, contrary to the general 
belief, the wide use of diphtheria antitoxin has 
neither lowered the number of cases, nor the 
deaths? (See Report of special inquiry by the 
New York City Health Department, published in 
the New York World for June 12, 19 16.) 

"Do you know that the Flexner serum for 
cerebro-spinal meningitis was injected into 15 
children in the City Hospital of Cincinnati, Ohio, 
and that 14 died within five minutes? (See full 
report in the Cincinnati Enquirer for March 18, 
1914.) 

"Do you know that the recurrence of the out- 



34 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

break of foot and mouth disease in 191 6 was due 
to anti-hog-cholera serum? (See Report of the 
Bureau of Animal Industry for September 28, 
1915.) 

"Do you know that, following this discovery, 
the Canadian Government passed a law prohibit- 
ing the use of these serums? 

"These are facts! Can you disprove them, or 
do you know anyone who can?" 

In thus striking at serum therapy, the newer 
schools were aiming a blow at the very foundation 
of the medical power. Mystery, like superstition, 
has always been a golden key in the hands of those 
whose superior knowledge enabled them to use it. 
Anybody who has followed the medical items in the 
public press will recall how consistently the mysteries 
of serum therapy have been overworked to reassure 
the public during the recent epidemics, and to allay 
the general clamor at the failure of the measures 
adopted by the medical authorities. These attacks 
were continued in pamphlets and in paid advertise- 
ments in the newspapers. That they were not with- 
out effect is shown by the difficulty which the advo- 
cates of serum therapy began to experience in ob- 
taining government appropriations for their work. 
Serious as this might appear to those who aimed at 
the permanent control of medicine in the United 
States, a still graver danger threatened. 



CHAPTER VI 

A NEW FACTOR 

Among the many brilliant investigators whose 
names are associated with the solution of the dis- 
ease problem, probably no one accomplished more 
than Paul Ehrlich. One of our greatest authori- 
ties on infection and immunity calls him the "Grand- 
master of experimental medicine." It was Ehrlich 
who demonstrated how the body, when attacked by 
pathogenic organisms, produced its antibodies, thus 
elucidating one of the most important problems in 
medicine, that of nature's second and final defence 
against disease. His side-chain theory has now 
passed many corroborative tests and is generally ac- 
cepted by the medical profession. 

This discovery was of the greatest importance, 
because hitherto it had been supposed that once the 
mechanism of the body was understood, the control 
of disease would be assured. Ehrlich was able to 
show that if the infection exceeded a certain degree 
of virulence, it was too powerful for the curative 
forces of the body. But in other sciences man has 
improved on nature's methods, and Ehrlich turned 

35 



36 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

to the germicide to find a power greater than nature 
herself was able to apply just where and when it 
was needed. Antiseptics had come into very general 
use for the treatment of all infections of the outer 
parts of the body, and they were widely employed 
in sanitation. Further, it had been shown that the 
effectiveness of some of the drugs of the older phar- 
macopoeia was partially due to germicidal proper- 
ties. Ehrlich began a series of experiments with a 
view to obtaining a germicide which could be used 
effectively in the body. And thus a new theory in 
medicine, chemotherapy, was born. 

The ordinary germicide is so poisonous that any 
attempt to employ it in the body for the destruction 
of a parasite would also prove fatal to the host. 
This was clearly the first difficulty to overcome. 
There are many chemicals with germicidal proper- 
ties whose toxicity can be partially or wholly neutral- 
ized by combination with other chemicals. Ehrlich 
conceived the idea of producing by chemical com- 
bination a germicide which, though the toxicity had 
been eliminated, would still retain sufficient germi- 
cidal power to be effective in medication. A second 
very serious difficulty was encountered. It soon de- 
veloped that a germicide might prove effective in 
the laboratory test tube but not when taken into 
the system, where it entered into a chemical com- 
bination with the albumins of the blood and so lost 



A NEW FACTOR 37 

its germicidal power. Ehrlich, however, was not to 
be baffled. Chemical after chemical was combined, 
and at last, in his six hundred and sixth attempt, he 
produced his Salvarsan. While Salvarsan was not 
entirely effective it served to demonstrate the correct- 
ness of the theory; and it was followed by a later 
combination on the same lines, Neo-salvarsan. 

In 1909 and 19 10 Ehrlich published treatises on 
his experiments in chemotherapy. These created a 
profound impression on the leaders of Organized 
Medicine. It was realized that if his theories were 
sound, chemistry would play the chief part in medi- 
cine in the future and the chemist who produced a 
perfect germicide would be in a position to dictate 
to the profession throughout the world. If chemo- 
therapy should replace serum therapy, the vast sums 
which the manufacturers and other advocates of 
serum were receiving might be turned into another 
channel. It was even within the bounds of possi- 
bility that chemists might be able to establish their 
right to places on the medical boards. Then, too, 
chemotherapy might be adopted by the newer schools 
of medicine and the union of these two interests 
form a combination which it would be difficult for 
the organization to withstand. There seemed but 
one way out, the passage of such laws as would in- 
sure complete control to the association. 

During the legislative campaign against patent 



38 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

medicines it had been demonstrated that restrictive 
laws could not be passed without outside help. There 
had been some successes, such as the passage of 
the laws relating to habit-forming drugs. But the 
legislatures were unwilling to restrict pharmaceu- 
tical chemistry to the point desired by the medical 
trust. The success of the drug law, however, sug- 
gested a way out of the difficulty. If, through a 
trade with the prohibitionists, the association should 
be able to put whisky on the prescription shelf, it 
would be but a short step further to extend the law 
to proprietaries containing alcohol. And this might 
be pushed further still to cover all pharmaceuticals, 
including germicides, once the people had become 
accustomed to government regulation in such 
matters. 

But time went by, Ehrlich died, and no chemist 
had been able to produce an effective internal germi- 
cide, although both European and American ex- 
perts had made many attempts. The medical trust 
began to breathe more easily. This, however, was 
not to last. In 191 6 the American Medical Asso- 
ciation was notified that a new germicide had been 
produced and that its effectiveness had been sub- 
stantiated by careful experiments. Some time was 
spent by the organization in verifying these facts 
and in negotiating for the control of formulas and 
process. But it was evident that control could not 



A NEW FACTOR 39 

be established in this way and that legislation must 
be resorted to. A time for action had come at last. 
At a meeting of the association held on June 6, 
19 1 7, Dr. Charles H. Mayo made a strong address 
in favor of national prohibition, and at a later meet- 
ing of the House of Delegates the following resolu- 
tion was passed: 

"Whereas, We believe that the use of alcohol 
is detrimental to the human economy, and 

Whereas, Its use in therapeutics as a tonic or 
stimulant or for food has no scientific value; 
therefore be it 

Resolved, That the American Medical Asso- 
ciation is opposed to the use of alcohol as a bev- 
erage; and be it further 

Resolved, That the use of alcohol as a thera- 
peutic agent should be further discouraged." 

The medical value of alcohol was known to the 
Babylonians and Phoenicians, and probably in the 
days before history was written. Yet in one sweep- 
ing statement the accumulated experience of cen- 
turies was thrown overboard. There is no more con- 
servative element in society than the medical pro- 
fession; its traditions and training all tend toward 
conservatism. How was it, then, that it permitted 
its leaders to put through anything so radical? In 
the first place, the sentiment was not unanimous. 



40 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

There was a strong minority feeling against the 
resolution and, following its passage, the question 
was agitated for months in the medical press. But 
the theories of Ehrlich's followers were also revolu- 
tionary. Medication by germicide was in some re- 
spects a complete departure from established prac- 
tice, and the very conservatism of the physician 
favored the passage of the resolution as the choice, 
if one must be made, between two evils. 

The medical practitioner receives his compensa- 
tion, in most instances, on the basis of the number of 
visits made. Preventive medicine, in spite of its 
boasted achievements, had not interfered with this 
method of charging. But Ehrlich's followers had 
demonstrated that the germicide would materially 
shorten the period of illness. Its adoption there- 
fore would reduce the physician's income until a new 
system of arranging fees should be put in force. 
This would not be difficult to devise, and common 
sense clearly calls for it. But the inertia of the pro- 
fession and the acquiescence of the public have so 
far preserved the old way. That is natural enough, 
no doubt; custom clings. But some clinging cloys. 
However, the antiquated fee system played its part, 
as has just been indicated, in the attitude assumed 
by the profession toward the two questions of press- 
ing importance brought before it — prohibition and 
chemotherapy. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CHEMOTHERAPY 

Society has long been looking for some method 
of treatment that will shorten the period of disease. 
Sanitation and preventive medicine have indeed done 
much to reduce the toll which sickness exacts from 
civilized communities. Nevertheless, there are still 
many diseases which appear periodically and run 
their course undeterred by scientific effort. There 
could be no more important contribution to national 
weal and wealth than cutting the waste caused by 
disease. This is one of the arguments used most 
frequently by the prohibitionists. We may there- 
fore consider briefly the theories of the chemothera- 
pists and see what, with the help of the prohibi- 
tionists, Organized Medicine was attempting to sup- 
press. 

Since the earliest days of medical science the cure 
of disease has been accomplished by the natural 
powers of the body. In cases where nature's defence 
and the attacking force of the infection approach 
equality, the physician's influence may be the decisive 
factor. By the use of drugs he may reduce fever, 

41 



42 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

relieve pain, correct intestinal disorders or stimulate 
activity in some organ; or by means of serum he may 
add to the protective forces which the body itself 
produces. But, in a large measure, we have relied 
on nature to accomplish the cure. 

The defensive forces of the body may be divided 
into two classes: those which are available at the 
time the infection occurs, and those which develop 
as the direct result of the infection. In the first 
class are normal serum and the power of the white 
blood corpuscles and other phagocytes to ingest dis- 
ease germs. In the second class are the various 
bacteriolytic and antitoxic antibodies which are lib- 
erated by the cells after disease has found a footing 
in the system. 

Infectious disease is caused by minute organisms 
which make their way through the outer coverings 
of the body into the system proper. This is termed 
infection. When it occurs the organisms or germs 
are met by the first defence of the body, the white 
blood corpuscles gathering at the point of invasion 
and taking up and destroying the invaders. If the 
germs are able to overcome this first line of defence, 
they multiply and infection develops into infectious 
disease. The system then calls upon its second de- 
fence, the antibodies. From this stage onward the 
conditions are those of a great battle (in its own 
sphere), each side bringing up its reserves in large 



SIGNIFICANCE OF CHEMOTHERAPY 43 

numbers; the germs, it may be, attempting to pre- 
vent antibody formation either directly, by the ac- 
tion of their toxins on the cells, or indirectly by 
their effect on the organs. Thus the disease advances 
to a crisis, the outcome depending upon the relative 
strength of the contending forces. All this involves 
of course a great strain on the body, and when the 
conflict is over and victory won, nature requires a 
period of convalescence to repair the incidental 
damage. 

In putting forward its secondary defence the body 
is responding to a stimulus, the presence of the germs 
in the system. In other words, it reacts to the in- 
fection. Antibody formation, or the manufacture 
of the body's own germicides and antitoxins, is not 
carried on actively until the infection has become 
established. Valuable time is thus lost while the 
system is adjusting itself to meet the invasion: un- 
preparedness, here at least, has its manifest dangers. 
Ehrlich's followers were able to demonstrate that 
a greater germicidal power than that of the body it- 
self could be applied as soon as the first symptoms 
gave warning of the infection, and that the germs 
could be destroyed in the body by means of a chemi- 
cal germicide long before nature could produce anti- 
bodies in sufficient number to affect the situation. 
Thus the progress of the disease could be appreciably 
shortened, and in consequence a long period of con- 



44 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

valescence avoided. But the chemotherapists went 
even a step further. They advanced the theory that 
the poison of disease in virulent form is almost as 
rapidly destructive as some of the mineral poisons 
and that often the time is limited in which success- 
ful treatment can be undertaken. Not only, then, 
did they advocate a treatment which would mate- 
rially shorten the period of illness, but they went so 
far as to say that disease must be cured at once 
unless the physician would risk the loss of his patient. 
There is nothing extraordinary in the opposition 
of the medical association to the germicide. It is not 
unprecedented for established interests to oppose the 
innovations which mark the advance of civilization, 
though they have always been forced to admit their 
error later and acknowledge the benefits which have 
come to them as to the rest of mankind. When 
textile machinery was introduced into England, it 
was met with riots and arson. At that time the 
Manchester weavers numbered five thousand. Just 
prior to the Great War this number had risen to 
nearly thirty thousand, while individual yardage had 
increased eight or ten times, though the population 
had not more than doubled. Comparatively re- 
cently, the introduction of the automobile was looked 
on with disfavor by the horse and carriage trade, 
from the manufacturer down to the lowest groom. 
Yet the prosperity enjoyed by the manufacturer who 



SIGNIFICANCE OF CHEMOTHERAPY 45 

has adopted the new vehicle has never been equalled 
in industrial history, while the coachman or groom 
has materially bettered himself by accepting the 
chauffeur's position. 

It is to be hoped that Organized Medicine, duly 
concerned with its own material interests, will re- 
alize that a living patient is more profitable than a 
dead one, and that it will be better for the physician 
to keep his patients alive even though a cure is ef- 
fected in a fewer number of chargeable visits. 



CHAPTER VIII 

A PROFITABLE PARTNERSHIP 

The resolution of the American Medical Asso- 
ciation condemning alcohol was of the utmost impor- 
tance to the advocates of prohibition. They realized 
fully that without this support it would be difficult to 
maintain the constitutionality of the Eighteenth 
Amendment. American institutions, including the 
Supreme Court, were created to carry out certain 
principles laid down in the Declaration of Independ- 
ence. Among these was the right of every man to 
live — apparently not an unreasonable proposition. 

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that 
all men are created equal; that they are endowed 
by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; 
that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit 
of happiness. That, to secure these rights, gov- 
ernments are instituted among men, deriving their 
just powers from the consent of the governed." 

If alcohol were necessary either as a food or a 

medicine to maintain life, then prohibition and the 

4 6 



A PROFITABLE PARTNERSHIP 47 

law for its enforcement would be clearly contrary 
to the spirit of the Constitution. There was a de- 
cision of the British courts declaring alcohol to be 
a food. That was not a legal precedent for Amer- 
ica, but it showed that an American precedent might 
easily be established. By some, alcohol was con- 
sidered almost fundamental in the treatment of dis- 
ease. If this could be maintained, no law could 
stand that would make it necessary to pay toll to a 
small privileged class to obtain a commodity, simple 
but indispensable, which can be manufactured in the 
home far more easily than most foods can be pre- 
pared. The resolution got around these difficulties 
by the statement that "alcohol is detrimental to the 
human economy." Thus the anomalous situation 
was created that the legality of an amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States might become de- 
pendent not upon the decision of the Supreme Court, 
but upon the fiat of a medical junto whose avowed 
purpose was to safeguard "the material interests of 
the medical profession.'* 

A programme had already been adopted by the 
association's Committee on Legislation. An exam- 
ination of the various bills that have been introduced 
from time to time will give some idea of the scope 
of this programme. They provide for the follow- 
ing: 



48 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Control of medical education and license to 
practise, including suppression of independent 
opinion and conduct. 

Compulsory publication of proprietary formulas 
and control of the sales through physicians' pre- 
scriptions. 

Compulsory health insurance, or, in other 
words, a state subsidy for the organized profes- 
sion. 

To these was now added the sole privilege of dis- 
pensing alcohol. The monopoly would serve two 
purposes. It would help to accustom the public to 
medical control of foods and drugs. It would prove 
remunerative, and thus restore some .of the income 
which had been lost to the profession through the 
active competition of the osteopaths and other health 
schools. How lucrative prohibition has actually 
proved to the medical profession is shown by a re- 
cent statement of the federal prohibition director 
of the State of Illinois. In the City of Chicago, 
where the headquarters of the American Medical 
Association are located, during the first four and 
one-half months of national prohibition five hundred 
thousand physicians' prescriptions for whisky were 
issued, and the federal department estimates that 
of these, three hundred thousand evaded the spirit 
or letter of the enforcement law. 



A PROFITABLE PARTNERSHIP 49 

To put the association's programme into effect, 
control of the legislatures would be necessary. It was 
also deemed advisable, if possible, to place a physi- 
cian in the White House. This could only be ac- 
complished with strong financial backing, but the 
support given to the prohibitionists by the associa- 
tion was worth any price which might be demanded. 
The necessary supplies could be obtained from the 
life insurance companies, whose medical departments 
may be classed as a branch of Organized Medicine, 
and through them from other great corporations, 
many of which are partly controlled by the insur- 
ance companies through their investments. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE OTHER PARTNERS 

In 1908 the life insurance companies undertook 
an investigation of the mortality among their policy 
holders. A committee of actuaries and medical di- 
rectors was appointed, of which Mr. Arthur Hunter, 
the Actuary of the New York Life Insurance Com- 
pany, was chairman. The material was taken from 
the records of two million policy holders and the 
inquiry covered the period from 1885 to 1908- 
Careful attention was directed to the mortality 
among those policy holders using alcohol and the 
results were classified according to the degree of 
their indulgence. The mortality among those en- 
gaged in the various branches of the liquor trade was 
ascertained separately, and the figures compared with 
the general average of insured individuals. From 
these statistics it was apparent that alcohol (or its 
environment) was distinctly unfavorable to longev- 
ity. Still, no attempt was made to analyze the dif- 
ferent conditions prevailing among total abstainers, 
so that no comparisons could be carried out to de- 
termine how much of the increased mortality was 

so 



THE OTHER PARTNERS 51 

actually due to alcohol, and how much could be at- 
tributed to unhealthy surroundings and other factors. 
Life insurance is run on a strictly business basis. 
The lower the annual premium, the better showing 
life insurance will make when compared with other 
forms of investment. If prohibition would improve 
the mortality table by increasing the general expect- 
ancy, the insurance companies could well afford to 
devote a few years' savings towards the cause, and 
this in itself would amount to an enormous sum. 
But aside from financial support, the cooperation of 
the life insurance companies was of special value 
because their statistics could be used to place pro- 
hibition in an attractive light before the corporations 
of the country. In recent years a great deal of time 
and thought has been given to increasing the effi- 
ciency of our industrial life. It is not surprising that 
alcohol should come under the unfavorable notice 
of the experts. In some instances it was unques- 
tionably increasing the cost of labor by depriving 
the employer of services for which he had paid 
and to which he was justly entitled. In addi- 
tion, there was some waste of raw material through 
bad workmanship. All this could be traced directly 
to alcohol, but on the other hand there were no 
means of computing its benefits, as the increased effi- 
ciency due to a higher standard of health or morals 
was problematical. The efficiency expert is seldom 



52 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

an economist, and further, he has to depend on 
others for technical information. It is not surpris- 
ing, therefore, that he was able to see only one side 
of the prohibition question. 

On account of our great natural wealth, American 
industries are growing at a rate which exceeds the 
natural increase of our population. This country 
is consequently dependent upon immigration for a 
considerable part of its labor requirements. Dur- 
ing the past 145 years thirty-three million immi- 
grants have entered the country. In 19 13, the last 
year before the tide of immigration was interrupted 
by the Great War, the net increase of population 
from foreign sources was 891,276. In 19 19, the 
year after the signing of the armistice, with national 
prohibition an assured fact, this increase amounted 
to only 20,790, and this, too, in spite of the unprece- 
dented rise in wages and the fact that American 
taxes are largely borne by the capitalistic class. It 
was not until it became apparent that national pro- 
hibition could not possibly be enforced that immigra- 
tion began to resume its normal flow. 

But there is still another side to the effect of 
prohibition on the labor situation. The further we 
descend in the social scale, the less man depends for 
guidance upon reason and the more he has to rely 
upon his instinct. The lower animals, if left to 
themselves, can trust their instinct to select the food 



THE OTHER PARTNERS 53 

which their bodies require. It is only when man or 
famine interferes that we find malnutrition in our 
wild or domestic animals. Similarly, the laboring 
classes under normal conditions eat and drink to 
restore the tissue which has been burned up in bodily 
exercise. Prohibition deprived them of a nourish- 
ment to which they had become accustomed, and no 
amount of reasoning on the part of those who did 
not share their conditions could convince them that 
this was right. Nor were all affected in the same 
way. It is an instructive commentary on the blun- 
dering fashion in which the matter was approached, 
that the efficiency experts apparently did not know 
that many of our foreign laborers were obtaining 
their alcohol in wines and other beverages made in 
their own homes. This was especially true of the 
Italians. There was hardly an Italian home with 
any ground around it which did not contain its little 
vineyard; and those less fortunate were often sup- 
plied by their neighbors. Interference with such a 
system, both primitive and picturesque, was bound 
to add to the general discontent; and even a small 
dissatisfied element is a dangerous thing in these 
days of labor unionism, since it often becomes an 
effective club in the hands of a radical leader. All 
this was pointed out to the prohibitionists by the 
officers of the American Federation of Labor, and 
subsequent events have justified their warning. 



54 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

But in the case of the Standard Oil Company- 
there were stronger reasons than the mere increased 
cost of labor for joining in any movement which had 
the approval of the American Medical Association. 

In 1 90 1 the Rockefellers entered the medical field- 
There could be no more important public service 
than that for which the Rockefeller Institute for 
Medical Research was established. It was with a 
feeling of general satisfaction that the public viewed 
this enterprise of our richest citizen, and it was not 
through any fault of the founder that the under- 
taking failed to fulfil its object. The institute was 
handicapped from the beginning by the fact that it 
had to look for its workers amongst establishments 
already controlled by the association or in sympathy 
with its aims and methods, and thus the blight which 
has hung over medicine throughout the country was 
inevitably introduced into the new foundation. 

While little has been accomplished from the sci- 
entific standpoint, the union of these two interests 
has been a great success commercially. The Rocke- 
feller support of the tenets of the association has 
aided the latter materially in its conflict with the 
newer schools. The reports of the institute have 
been valuable propaganda for the medical organiza- 
tion. No one could well question the disinterested- 
ness of these reports, and yet there were influential 
men within the institution who were able to guide its 



THE OTHER PARTNERS 55 

activities along the lines best suited to the interests 
of the association. 

In return, the association has put the stamp of its 
approval on the petroleum laxatives manufactured 
by the Standard Oil Company. These products sell 
for four times the price petroleum brings for illumi- 
nating purposes. But the use of mineral oil and 
other laxatives has been condemned both by the 
physicians of health and the chemotherapists as a 
worthless and dangerous practice. If Mr. Rocke- 
feller's scientists had by any chance communicated 
to the officers of his company the plans to discredit 
the newer schools, they could scarcely have proved 
objectionable to the sales management of the Stand- 
ard Oil Company. Nor could any individual — cer- 
tainly not Mr. Rockefeller himself — be blamed for 
this condition of affairs. It is the system which is at 
fault. To-day the science of medicine is an open 
book to the initiated, but through a com- 
plicated system of technical terms and hiero- 
glyphics it has been made a mystery to the lay- 
man, a mystery as fascinating and sometimes as 
misleading as the fairy tales of our childhood. 
The management of a great corporation is 
carried on through a series of departments and the 
responsibility is divided, from the president or chair- 
man of the board down to the lowest clerk. It was 
sufficient for the officials that Mr. Rockefeller was 



56 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

willing to back this charitable enterprise. They 
trusted to a business acumen which until then had 
never been at fault. Nor are his scientists to blarne. 
The system of medical education in the United States 
reaches down to the primary schools. If a man is 
forced to wear red or blue glasses from boyhood, he 
is apt to become color blind. 

And so we find a collection of associations and 
corporations whose interests were all closely allied. 
Yet it were foolish to assert that prohibition was the 
result of an arch conspiracy, although there was 
much plotting and planning within the organizations 
themselves. Each of these interests was probably 
going quietly along, minding its own business, like 
cattle grazing contentedly on a wide plain. Then 
somebody started something, and the stampede came 
off. 

And what about the Anti-Saloon League? A 
very interesting sidelight on the part played by this 
organization has recently been disclosed. It seems 
that when certain prominent citizens of Georgia 
decided that for political reasons the state must 
become dry, they encountered the opposition of the 
league's representatives. For years these men had 
been living on prohibition. Time after tima the 
law had been brought to the point of passing, only 
to be held over for a future legislature because they 
feared that with prohibition the services of the 



THE OTHER PARTNERS 57 

league would no longer be needed. When the new 
interests took charge of the national movement, the 
Anti-Saloon League was assigned to a place which 
it could fill to the advantage of the cause, but in 
which the Georgia fiasco would not be repeated. 
The last days of Demon Rum resembled a tiger 
hunt in the jungles of India ; the Anti-Saloon League 
were the beaters. The organization was well 
equipped to play the role. Men of the stamp of 
William H. Anderson, Pussyfoot Johnson, William 
Jennings Bryan, R. P. Hobson of Merrimac fame, 
and Wayne B. Wheeler, the cock-horse of the Vol- 
stead Committee, could be depended on to supply 
the noise. But the men with the guns loaded with 
silver bullets represented those interests which had 
something more at stake than simply removing the 
curse of alcoholism from the weakling. 

If there is still any doubt in the mind of the reader 
as to the real power behind the prohibition move- 
ment, let him examine the foreword written by 
Professor Irving Fisher for Dr. Fisk's book 
"Alcohol — Its Relation to Human Efficiency and 
Longevity." The following is a brief extract : 

"Many things are now known concerning the 
effects — physiological, psychological and social — 
of alcohol, which were not known a few years 
ago ; and there is, consequently, a growing desire 



58 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

on the part of men of affairs to learn the exact 
facts and to make use of this knowledge in their 
business. Indeed, it may be said that the chief 
driving force to-day toward temperance and total 
abstinence, whether voluntary or enforced, is an 
economic force — the constant urge toward indus- 
trial efficiency. It is this new force which, added 
to forces previously at work, has in recent years 
caused the tidal wave of prohibition to sweep over 
this country." 



CHAPTER X 

SOME PROHIBITION PROPAGANDA 

It may be only a coincidence, but the fact is never- 
theless worth recording, that Dr. Fisk's book on 
alcohol, the resolution of the American Medical 
Association denouncing alcohol, and the association's 
condemnation of the chemotherapists, appeared 
within a few days of one another in the summer of 
19 17. Dr. Fisk's book presents the life insurance 
companies' case against alcohol. It is possibly the 
most ambitious presentation of the prohibition ques- 
tion from this standpoint. It has the endorsement 
of many prominent members of the American Med- 
ical Association sitting on the Hygiene Reference 
Board of the Life Extension Institute. 

Dr. Fisk's writings did much to further the cause 
of prohibition. They acquired a wide circulation — 
many of his chapters having previously appeared in 
the form of magazine articles. They may therefore 
be considered as typical examples of prohibition prop- 
aganda. The book itself is more of a compilation 
than an individual effort. The author seems to have 
taken the prohibition arguments — many of them 

59 



60 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

manufactured in the laboratory, away from actual 
living conditions — at their face value, and to have 
passed them on to his readers without any attempt 
to analyze them. It is not so much what Dr. Fisk 
has said as what he has left unsaid that brands many 
of these representations as the rankest sophistry. 
For example, under the heading of "Alcohol and 
Resistance" we find: 

u Fillinger found the resistance of the red blood- 
cells much reduced after administration of cham- 
pagne to healthy human subjects, and similar re- 
sults were found in dogs and rabbits. Weinberg 
confirmed these results by similar methods, show- 
ing that 20 per cent, of the red cells lose their re- 
sistance after the administration of 450 cubic cen- 
timetres of champagne." 

Here is a direct accusation against alcohol and 
a very serious one, for antibody formation, the 
body's natural defence against disease, is dependent 
on the health of the cells. 

Champagne contains about 13 percent, of alcohol. 
If it were the alcohol in this beverage which caused 
the injury to the red blood-cells, we might reasonably 
expect a similar result from other wines or malt 
liquors in proportion to their alcoholic content. As 
this is not the case, we must look further for the 
harmful effect of champagne. Now champagne 



SOME PROHIBITION PROPAGANDA 61 

contains a deadly poison, carbon dioxide (C0 2 ) or 
carbonic acid gas. There is probably more of this 
gas in champagne than in any other beverage. Any 
little chorus girl along Broadway will tell you that 
the popular name for the popular wine is "bubbles." 
If we turn to our chemistry we find: 

A rose placed in a glass bulb from which the air 
is removed while C0 2 is introduced will lose its 
color at once. 

An animal introduced into an atmosphere of 
pure C0 2 dies almost instantly and without en- 
trance of the gas into the lungs, death resulting 
from spasm of the glottis (ventricle of the larynx) 
and consequent apnoea (absence of respiration). 

An animal will die rapidly in an atmosphere 
composed of 21 per cent. O (oxygen), 59 per cent. 
N (nitrogen), and 20 per cent. C0 2 by volume; 
but it will live for several hours in an atmosphere 
whose composition is 40 per cent. O, 37 per cent. 
N and 23 per cent. C0 2 . When present in large 
proportion, C0 2 produces immediate loss of mus- 
cular power, and death without a struggle; when 
more dilute, a sense of irritation of the larynx, 
drowsiness, pain in the head, giddiness, gradual 
loss of muscular power, and death in coma.* 

* "The Medical Student's Manual of Chemistry"; Witt- 
haus, pp. 355-6. 



62 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

This is the reason for the seriousness of the 
"champagne jag." If Dr. Fisk has forgotten his 
chemistry, was there no one on the Hygiene Refer- 
ence Board who could have brought these elementary 
facts to his attention? The doctor tells us in his 
preface that "The Board was practically unanimous 
in endorsing the author's presentation of the evi- 
dence, only a few members dissenting." 

Here is another example. 

The prohibitionists have endeavored to create the 
impression that alcohol is one of the chief causes of 
insanity. Dr. Fisk says, "Psychopathic conditions 
(i.e. those relating to mental disease), including 
excessive or palpably injurious indulgence in alcohol, 
developing after the 'risks' had been on the books 
(of the life insurance companies) must be accepted 
in the main as a charge against so-called moderate 
drinking. They are quite as much a possible effect 
of moderate drinking as any of the many other path- 
ological conditions that are known to result from 
steady drinking, such as cirrhosis of the liver, fatty 
liver, or kidney affections, or the various forms of 
nervous disease or life-failure that may result from 
the psychic disturbances due to alcohol."* This is 
all in a piece with the statement of the prohibition- 
ists which was circulated in the public press, that 

* "Alcohol — Its Relation to Human Efficiency and Lon- 
gevity" ; Fisk, pp. 49, 50. 



-SOME PROHIBITION PROPAGANDA 63 

"the intemperate use of alcohol is filling our insane 
asylums, jails, poorhouses and cemeteries." Let us 
see how near the truth these assertions are. 

The total number of insane patients admitted to 
our hospitals in the year 19 10, according to the 
figures of the Census Bureau,* was 60,700. Of 
these, 6,122, or 10.7 per cent., were suffering from 
alcoholic psychosis. Careful investigations showed 
that out of a total of 25,000,000 males who used 
alcoholic beverages, about 5000, or one-fiftieth of 
one per cent., developed alcoholic insanity annually. 
This is the basis for the statement that "alcohol is 
filling our insane asylums." A further examination 
of these statistics showed that in a great many in- 
stances alcoholism was not the cause but merely a 
symptom of some inherent mental defect, either 
congenital or acquired. Dr. William A. White, 
superintendent of the government hospital for the 
insane (St. Elizabeth's Hospital) at Washington, 
D. C, says in his paper on the subject, presented at a 
meeting of the Society for the Study of Inebriety : 

"Is alcohol in these cases only a symptom of 
some underlying fundamental condition which has 
escaped our notice, simply because it is too subtle 
to be seen by casual observation or found by ordi- 
nary methods of inquiry? I think it is, and my 

*The figures for the 1920 census are not yet available. 



64 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

attention was first attracted to this possibility 
many years ago. Some of you at least will re- 
member the work of the English hereditarian, G. 
Archdall Reid, 'Darwinism and Race Progress/ 
in which the author, who, I may remind you, has 
since written many able and learned works, under- 
took a statistical study of the effects produced by 
prohibition in several of our prohibition states, 
where prohibition statutes had been in operation 
for a considerable number of years. His con- 
clusions were no less striking than unexpected at 
that time. They were to the effect that the sta- 
tistics clearly indicated that in these states, as the 
consumption of alcohol had been diminished and 
as drunkenness had been lessened, the admission 
to the insane asylums and poorhouses had pro- 
gressively and correspondingly increased. If we 
do not instantly discard such a conclusion as this, 
and will stop for a moment and give it careful 
consideration, we must be struck by the probability 
of its truth and by its important social significance. 
Such a conclusion can only mean that the alcoholic 
as such is a mental defective in some way, and that 
if his mental deficiency does not show as indul- 
gence in alcohol, it will later show as a frank 
mental disease, or as that type of deficiency which 
leads to pauperism. 

"This conclusion, I am convinced, is a correct 



SOME PROHIBITION PROPAGANDA 6s 

one, and I am reminded as I dictate these words 
of the occasion of a meeting of your society here 
at Washington some two or three years ago in 
which I heard your president, a man grown old 
in this particular work, say in discussion that he 
had never seen an inebriate who aside from his 
inebriety was a normal man." 

But the most convincing evidence of the fallacy of 
Dr. Fisk's statement is furnished by the figures of 
the Census Bureau. These statistics show that in 
19 10 wet Nebraska had the lowest insanity rate of 
any state in the Union, while dry Oklahoma had, 
with the exception of Colorado and Nevada, the 
highest rate. In Maine, the banner prohibition state, 
the number of insane persons increased from 92.6 
per 100,000 in 1890 to 169.5 per 100,000 in 1910, 
a gain in the wrong direction of 83 per cent, for the 
twenty year period. In Kansas, another prohibition 
state, the insanity rate increased 94 per cent. Wet 
Rhode Island, on the other hand, showed a gain of 
only 16 per cent, during the same period. 

So far as suicidal insanity is concerned, Dr. John 
P. Davin, of New York, summed up unfettered med- 
ical opinion on the figures since prohibition went 
into effect, and placed the responsibility in the right 
place. Here is his letter to the press :* 

* See the New York World for August 15, 192.1. 



66 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

"That suicides have more than doubled, not in 
a year, as you state, but in half a year, according 
to the figures of the Save-a-Life League, is not to 
be attributed to a suicide wave. Neither is it to 
be attributed to a reaction of the war, to business 
depression or to loss of work. 

"In a previous report of the Save-a-Life League 
the effects of prohibition and drug laws were em- 
phasized as a factor in the increase which was 
notecl by the society at that time also. 

"Anyone at all familiar with the physical con- 
ditions associated with the use of alcohol or nar- 
cotic drugs knows that the deprivation of either is 
followed by a depression that speedily deepens into 
a contempt for life. This does not necessarily 
mean the abuse of these agents by those addicted 
to their use. . . . Crusades have been entered 
upon by the government, urged on by lay agents 
having no realization of the physical effects of 
their actions, but who are carried away solely by 
an enthusiasm for the moral regeneration which is 
to follow their reforms. To what an extent this 
has been carried on in this country is shown by 
the legislative struggle now going on in Congress 
to prohibit a physician from prescribing a bottle 
of ale or beer for the sick or aged. No wonder 
suicides are increasing here as they are nowhere 
else unafflicted with this form of legislation." 



SOME PROHIBITION PROPAGANDA 67 

Probably the most one-sided of all Dr. Fisk's 
prohibition "arguments" is his distortion of the re- 
ports of investigators as to the effect of alcohol on 
human efficiency. He has devoted considerable space 
to tests made in the Nutrition Laboratory at Boston 
and to the experiments of German scientists, all of 
which tend to show a lowered efficiency in the worker 
when alcohol is taken even in small doses. The fol- 
lowing is a typical quotation : 

"Aschaffenberg found that moderate doses of 
alcohol lowered the amount of work done by print- 
ing compositors and increased the liability to 
error." 

Now let us look at the other side of the story. A 
piece of machinery can be kept in operation for a 
long time without rest or repair, but eventually it 
must be stopped and overhauled or it will go to 
pieces. The human machine can operate for a short 
time only without rest or relaxation. But when the 
body has become relaxed, from whatever cause, its 
productive efficiency is temporarily impaired, of 
course. Yet such relaxation, whether it begins with 
the nervous system under the influence of alcohol, 
or in some other way, is a necessary preliminary to 
renewed efficiency. When the system is strained by 
too great effort, alcohol helps materially to induce 
relaxation. The highest form of relaxation is sleep. 



68 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

If these laboratory tests had been made while the 
subject was under the influence of sleep they would 
have been considered a joke. They are no less a 
joke from the scientific standpoint because they have 
been made to seem specious to those unfamiliar with 
simple logical principles. 

The impression we get from all this is that the 
author depended for the success of his "arguments" 
on the ignorance of his readers. It is by arguments 
such as these that the dry party has attempted to 
make prohibition appear attractive or at least rea- 
sonable to the public. The other side of the 
question has never been presented. Let us therefore 
review the life insurance companies' case against 
alcohol and see what they have found it expedient 
to leave unsaid. 



CHAPTER XI 

ALCOHOL AND LONGEVITY 

The interests of a nation and an individual citizen, 
or group of citizens, are not always identical. Lon- 
gevity is distinctly a case in point. It may be expe- 
dient for the welfare of a nation, or even absolutely 
necessary for its continued existence, that the lives of 
some of its citizens be sacrificed. Many of our 
countrymen voluntarily offered their lives for the 
national cause in the Great War. If they carried a 
life insurance company's policy, they had to pay an 
extra premium for the privilege of being patriotic. 
This may have been merely fair to the other policy 
holders, but it was not in accordance with the wel- 
fare of the nation as a whole. Such conflicts of 
interests will be found in the pursuits of peace as 
well as in the exigencies of war. 

We have only to study the personal history of 
some of our industrial leaders to see the fallacy of 
applying the insurance companies' theories on lon- 
gevity to our national life. There are many men, 
well known in our banking and commercial circles, 
who can still look back and recall with affection one 

69 



70 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

of the principal figures of their early business expe- 
rience. They see a little man seated at a table 
before a soft coal fire in a sunny room in the financial 
district, a sandwich in one hand, a pencil in the other, 
working out some problem which could not be de- 
layed for culinary comforts. Trained from boyhood 
in the school of our great merchants in the days 
when the clipper ships still thrust their bowsprits 
across the streets on the river front, before the 
telephone and the typewriter had simplified business 
correspondence, when night work was often the rule 
rather than the exception, he had acquired habits of 
industry which he was never willing to forsake, even 
under the pressure of failing health. If work was 
to be done, it mattered little when it was completed, 
and he often worked until midnight. It is industry 
such as this that wins success. He was one of our 
/dominant constructive men. 

He built up America's leading company in a basic 
industry. He endowed colleges, founded churches 
and educational institutions. If a friend needed 
assistance, he was always ready to leave his own 
multitudinous affairs and give sage counsel or 
material help. Yet, from the insurance companies 1 
standpoint, his life was a failure because he literally 
wore out his body before its allotted time. Which, 
think you, is the better citizen or of more value to 
the nation, a man such as this, or the man who lives 



ALCOHOL AND LONGEVITY 71 

his eighty or ninety years in comparative idleness 
and dies in the poorhouse? 

There are occasions, after great physical or mental 
effort, when the body calls for alcohol. Perhaps if 
we could rest, "lay 06°' for a day or two as advised 
by the physicians of health, spend the time in bed if 
need be, the body would make its own repairs and 
we should be the better for it. But this is not 
always possible in our business life. A man may not 
be able to leave his affairs in charge of his clerks. 
A banker or a broker on the floor of the Exchange 
would laugh at the idea of deserting his partners in 
time of emergency because his nervous system was 
overstrained. Instead, he was accustomed to steady 
his nerves with a cocktail, "take a bracer" as he 
called it, and thus stimulate digestion for his evening 
meal, so that he would be able to sleep at night and 
"go at it again" the next day. Alcohol has been 
likened in such cases to the whip which kills a tired 
horse. It is not the whip that kills, but the pace. And 
so, if we could analyze the life insurance statistics, we 
should find in many instances that it was not the 
alcohol which shortened life, but the over-exertion 
which it makes possible. This may be an abuse of 
alcohol, but it is not the abuse of the temperance 
lecturer. The question arises, Has the individual a 
right to use his own judgment in these matters ? He 



72 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

may make mistakes, of course. On the other hand, 
he may not. 

Nature's ways are not the ways of civilization. 
When she made alcohol it was perhaps without pre- 
vision of the manifold changes which civilization 
would effect in our mode of life. Alcohol may not 
invariably fit these changes, but that is surely no 
reason for depriving mankind of a vital gift. 

We can sometimes get a clearer view of a subject 
if we look at it from a new angle. I have spent 
many a pleasant hour wandering over the hills of 
New England. Recently, on the crest of a heavily 
wooded hillside, I found the mark of the last furrow 
turned by a plow on what had once been cultivated 
land, in the days before the youth of New England 
set out to find their fortunes in the prairie states of 
the Middle West. New England is full of aban- 
doned farms. It is an interesting study to see how 
nature reclaims the worn-out pastures and restores 
to its virgin fertility the soil which man has robbed 
of its plant food until it will no longer bear a profit- 
able crop. First, a carpet of weeds and rough 
grasses is spread upon the land, then come the briars 
and bushes, the sumacs, and the weeds of the forest, 
the white birch. Every leaf that falls, every root 
that dies, is adding its mite of plant food to the 
renewed fertility of the mold. And now the young 
forest trees spring up where the soil is strong enough 



ALCOHOL AND LONGEVITY 73 

to bear them, growing with ever increasing vigor 
and crowding off their weaker neighbors until a 
forest again covers the hillside. Autumn after 
autumn they cast their leaves upon the ground, to 
be packed down by the snows of winter and rot when 
summer returns. Nature's process is perfect, but 
it may take a hundred years. It is too slow for the 
husbandman. He employs the methods of civiliza- 
tion. He stimulates the soil's flagging powers with 
a fertilizer and, if his crops take more out of the 
soil than he is able to return, he will tell you that it 
is his land and he has the right to do with it as he 
pleases. No one would think of blaming him for 
overworking his land to prevent the foreclosure of a 
mortgage and thus save the roof over his family's 
head. Yet Dr. Fisk's theories condemn the business 
man who overworks his body for the sake of his 
pressing interests. Shall we hold up to scorn such 
a man, who chooses to crowd the work of two life- 
times into the productive years of his prime ? The 
question is as old as Cicero's "De Senectute" : shall 
we measure life by the calendar or by its accom- 
plishments ? 

After all, the body is but a human machine which 
will wear out from too much service, like those made 
of steel and brass, or which will rust and deteriorate 
from neglect and imperfect use. No doubt it might 
be better for the average citizen to seek a happy 



74 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

mean of safe and not exhausting effort. But man 
cannot always find the good that he desires, or desire 
the good that he may find. It is often necessary for 
him to effect a compromise between his own ten- 
dencies and the complex requirements of civilization. 
If alcohol helps him to do this, should he be deprived 
of a boon which nature herself has furnished ? 



CHAPTER XII 

MORE FALLACIOUS PROPAGANDA 

The life insurance companies' statistics feature the 
"Occupational Hazards from Alcohol." "Not the 
least important feature," says Dr. Fisk,* "of the 
investigation conducted by the forty-two companies 
was the mortality figures in occupations where 
alcohol figured as a hazard." 

These figures were as follows : 

Hotels 

Death-rate above 
the normal. 
Proprietors, superintendents and man- 
agers not tending bar 35 per cent. 
Proprietors, superintendents and man- 
agers tending bar 78 per cent. 

Saloons and Billiard-Rooms, 
Pool-Rooms and Bowling-Alleys 
with Bar 

Proprietors and managers not tending 

bar 82 per cent. 

Proprietors and managers tending bar 73 per cent. 

* "Alcohol — Its Relation to Human Efficiency and Lon- 
gevity"; pp. 31-34. 

75 



76 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Breweries 

Proprietors, managers and superinten- 
^ dents 35 per cent. 

Clerks 30 per cent. 

Foremen, maltsters, beer-pump repair- 
men and journeymen 52 per cent. 

Distilleries 

Proprietors, managers and superinten- 
dents below normal 1 5 per cent. 

Travelling salesmen and collectors for 
distilleries, breweries and wholesale 
liquor houses (excluding lifelong total 
abstainers) above normal 28 per cent. 

Wholesale Liquor Houses 

Proprietors and managers 22 per cent. 

Clerks 12 per cent. 

Restaurants with Bar 

Proprietors, superintendents and man- 
agers not tending bar 52 per cent. 

Waiters in hotels, restaurants and clubs 

where liquor is served 77 per cent. 

"These figures indicate," Dr. Fisk says, "that 
saloon-keepers have a death-rate higher than that 
of underground mine foremen; that brewery fore- 
men, maltsters, and the like, have a death-rate higher 
than electric linemen, glass- workers, city firemen 
(laddermen, pipemen, hosemen), metal grinders or 
hot-iron workers, although there is nothing in the 



MORE FALLACIOUS PROPAGANDA 77 

brewery or saloon business per se that is at all haz- 
ardous or unhealthful, aside from the possible temp- 
tation to drink and its collateral hazards. Proprie- 
tors of distilleries are obviously not so directly ex- 
posed to temptation or to other adverse influences 
that obtain in the retail liquor trade; this accounts 
for the favorable mortality." 

The further we follow these life insurance statis- 
tics, the more we are apt to wonder whether any 
real attempt has been made to analyze them. Cer- 
tainly the interpretation which is here given to them 
is not in accordance with scientific facts. There is 
no mystery about the cause of premature old age, 
with all its infirmities and early death. Metchni- 
koff's work in this particular field of research is 
well known. Unquestionably his greatest contribu- 
tion to medical science was his discovery of the 
function of the white corpuscles of the blood. But 
his popular fame will always rest upon his theories 
for the prolongation of human life. 

It is nature's familiar law that all flesh returns to 
the soil from which it came. Nature's agents of 
disintegration are the putrefying bacteria which 
cause flesh to decay. The activities of these bacteria 
are not confined to the dead animal body. The mi- 
nute organisms are in the air and are taken into the 
system with our food. Under favorable conditions 
(for the bacteria) the intestines become infested, 



78 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

with the result that there is putrefactive fermenta- 
tion of the animal and vegetable substances in proc- 
ess of digestion. Thus toxins are formed which are 
absorbed by the blood, causing a slow, insidious 
poisoning of the vital organs and the entire system, 
until finally the body is forced to give up the struggle 
long before its allotted time. Metchnikoff proved 
that the presence or absence of putrefaction in the 
large intestine is the chief factor that affects the 
duration of life. Over ninety per cent, of all human 
ailments are directly or indirectly traceable to these 
intestinal poisons, or, as the condition is commonly 
called, auto-intoxication. 

Alcohol is contra-fermentative. Vegetable and 
animal products are often preserved in alcoholic 
liquors. Therefore, even if it does not actually 
correct the fermentation, it could in no way add to 
the putrefaction in the digestive tract. It is quite 
evident that if we have an increased death-rate 
among the proprietors of saloons of 82 per cent., 
due to alcohol, we cannot in addition attribute 90 per 
cent. — : the established quota — to auto-intoxication. 
A very simple arithmetical calculation will demon- 
strate that the death-rate would be 72 per cent, 
above the possible. The reader must, therefore, 
choose between the theories of Dr. Fisk and those of 
Professor Metchnikoff. 

A closer inspection of the figures will throw fur- 



MORE FALLACIOUS PROPAGANDA 79 

ther light on the subject. In nearly all the situations 
in which the highest death-rate occurs, we find that 
the occupant is deprived of proper exercise. While 
everybody is subject to auto-intoxication, it is far 
more prevalent amongst those who lead a sedentary 
life. Nature's corrective for this condition is exer- 
cise. By invigorating the intestinal tract, this in- 
duces a more perfect evacuation of the waste matter, 
and the toxemia is carried off through the pores of 
the skin in perspiration. Exercise in which the 
abdominal muscles are brought into play is the most 
effective. 

In the saloon or hotel barroom the hours were 
long. In many of our cities it was found expedient to 
regulate the hours for closing. The larger barrooms 
employed two staffs to handle the night and day 
business. But in a large number of the smaller 
places this could not be afforded; consequently the 
proprietors, managers and bartenders remained at 
their desks or behind the bar for long hours at a 
time. I venture to believe that, if the truth were 
known, the death-rate among bartenders was no 
higher than among shop-girls spending the same 
amount of time day in and day out, year in and year 
out, behind the ribbon counter. 

We also find a much higher mortality among pro- 
prietors and employees of breweries than among the 
same class of individuals connected with distilleries. 



80 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

The death-rate among proprietors, managers and 
superintendents of distilleries is even fifteen per cent, 
below normal. Malt liquor contains from three to 
seven per cent, alcohol, distilled liquor about fifty 
per cent. But beers also contain nitrogenous nu- 
trients subject to fermentation, and the alcoholic con- 
tent is too low to have any appreciable deterrent ef- 
fect. No less an authority than Dr. Abraham Jacobi 
maintained that alcohol is an intestinal antiseptic. 
If this is true, the higher the alcoholic content the 
greater the protection against fermentation and con- 
sequent self-poisoning. Of course, when Dr. Fisk 
says "Proprietors of distilleries are obviously not so 
directly exposed to temptation," he is simply guess- 
ing. If I also should hazard a guess, I should say 
that the manufacture of whisky was lucrative, and 
the distillery-proprietor could afford to take, and did 
take, sufficient time away from his business to ride, 
shoot, play golf, etc., and so keep his body in better 
physical condition. 

It is easy to prove almost any proposition by 
figures, if one is careful to select only statistics which 
support the contention. What is the effect of alcohol 
on those who lead an active life? Here are some 
data obtained by Dr. Charles E. Woodruff, surgeon 
with the rank of major in the United States Army, 
from the observation of about twenty-eight hundred 
United States infantry and cavalry on active duty in 



MORE FALLACIOUS PROPAGANDA 81 

the Philippines in the early days of the American 
occupation. 

"Approximately n per cent, of the abstainers 
died, while about 3}4 per cent, of the moderate 
and less than 2 per cent, of the excessive drinkers 
died. About 15 per cent, of abstainers were 
invalided home, about 9 or 10 per cent, of the 
moderate and about 8 per cent, of the excessive 
drinkers. About 26 per cent, of abstainers, 24 
per cent, of moderate and 24 per cent, of excessive 
drinkers deteriorated in health. About 49 per 
cent, of abstainers, 64 per cent, of moderate and 
66 per cent, of excessive drinkers retained their 
health. There were very few who improved in 
health in any class, but the percentage among the 
abstainers was a trifle higher than among the 
excessive and less than among the moderate 
drinkers." * 

On his return from the islands, Dr. Woodruff 
published his conclusions in the New York Medical 
Record of December 17, 1904, from which the fol- 
lowing is taken: 

"In 1902 I obtained a mass of data as to the 
physical condition and drinking habits of a regi- 
ment of infantry which had been about three 
* "Medical Ethnology"; Woodruff, p. 149. 



82 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

years in the Philippines, to which was added about 
two troops of cavalry of about fifteen months' 
service. Each company commander divided his 
men into four classes as to health: i. those who 
retained health; 2. those who deteriorated in 
health; 3. those who were invalided home for 
disease, and 4. those who died of disease. The 
drinking habits of each man were also given, as 
1. total abstainers; 2. moderate drinker, who was 
never drunk; 3. excessive drinker, who was occa- 
sionally or periodically intoxicated. I know the 
figures to be as near the truth as it is possible to 
make them, because officers gave me the data, and 
their minor personal equations were neutralized. 

"I must confess to being somewhat disconcerted 
and disheartened at first by the totals; the exces- 
sive drinkers were far healthier than the abstain- 
J ers, only one-half as many were sent home sick, 
and only one-sixth as many of them died. I had 
hoped to prove the opposite. . . . The damage 
done to these young men by occasional sprees is 
not so great as the damage done by the climate to 
abstainers. What a lot of misstatements have we 
received from our teachers, text-books and au- 
thorities ! 

"I suppose some medical editors would advise 
hiding these figures on the ground that they would 
be an advantage to the whisky dealers who buy 



MORE FALLACIOUS PROPAGANDA 83 

Kansas corn- from prohibition farmers. They 
would no doubt rather see our soldiers die than let 
them know that a drink of wine at meals might 
save their lives." (Truly a prophecy of what 
was to occur later in the Army camps and in the 
United States Navy during the Great War.) 
"Think of the statement that 'the claim that the 
use of alcohol is desirable in the tropics is refuted 
beyond the possibility of discussion/ (Boston 
Medical and Surgical Journal, June 21, 1900), a 
statement for which there is no basis in fact. 
There are no figures, statistics or trustworthy 
data in existence upon which such a statement 
could be based. 

"This attitude in defence of current opinion is 
dangerously near to the old one, which we hoped 
had disappeared from New England forever; we 
can almost hear the echo of that short dark period 
when its people said, 'The claim that there are no 
witches is refuted beyond the possibility of dis- 



cussion.' " 



That is a valuable contribution to the subject, by 
a man clearly more interested in the truth and bear- 
ing of his facts than in clinging to preconceptions 
which his own experience has proved to be mistaken. 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE LABORATORY VS. NATURE 

There are many things which we have learned to 
use and enjoy in moderation, such as alcohol and 
other foods and beverages, fire and ice, steam, 
electricity and various familiar agencies, which may 
become sources of danger if allowed to get beyond 
control. Moderation is of course one of the car- 
dinal rules of our existence. Too much of a good 
thing is often more harmful than a little of what is 
really bad. The immoderate use of alcohol is clearly 
detrimental not only to the individual, but also to 
society. In well-governed communities drunkenness, 
like other excesses, is taken care of in the police 
courts or hospitals. It was necessary for the pro- 
hibitionist to prove that even the moderate use of 
alcohol was harmful, lest, with the proper enforce- 
ment of existing laws, he should find himself in the 
position of Don Quixote, tilting at his windmills. 

In recent years much thought and study have been 

given to the nourishment of the body. Many foods, 

and alcohol among them, have been the subjects of 

careful laboratory examination and experimentation. 

The prohibitionists have made good use of the un- 

84 



THE LABORATORY VS. NATURE 85 

favorable side of these experiments to further their 
propaganda. In this way they have endeavored to 
show that alcohol is not a stimulant, but, on the 
contrary, a narcotic, a depressant; that it has no 
food or medical value, but is a toxic substance and 
definitely injurious, even when used in moderation. 
The following comments by Professor W. S. Hall 
will serve as an example of the methods adopted. 

'The Energy from Alcohol not Avail- 
able. — Is the energy liberated in the oxidation of 
alcohol in the liver available for the use of 
muscles, nervous system or glands? If this ques- 
tion is answered affirmatively, then alcohol is a 
food. If negatively, then alcohol is not a food. 

"All body oxidation may be classified in two 
groups: 1. Active Oxidations, which take place 
in the active tissues, muscles, nervous system or 
glands, — and take place incident to action. Active 
oxidations are under perfect control of the ner- 
vous system and are proportional to normal ac- 
tivity. 2. Protective Oxidations, which take place 
in the liver. This class of oxidation-process is 
wholly independent of the usual tissue activity, 
and is proportional to the ingestion of toxic 
substances and independent of muscular action, 
brain action or gland action (other than liver 
action). 



86 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

"If the oxidation of alcohol in the liver belongs 
to Class i, the following consequences should be 
found: First, the ingestion of alcohol would lead 
to an increased muscular power and an increased 
capacity for brain work, and increased glandular 
activity. Second, the ingestion of alcohol would 
serve to maintain body temperature in the healthy 
individual subjected to low external temperature. 
Third, the increase of muscle, brain or gland ac- 
tivity would be proportional to the amount of 
alcohol ingested. Now laboratory observations 
and general experience show that none of these 
things is true: that is, the ingestion of alcohol 
decreases muscle, brain and gland work and de- 
presses body temperature when external temper- 
ature is low. The oxidation does not therefore 
belong to Class i. 

"If the oxidation of alcohol in the liver belongs 
to Class 2, the following consequences would be 
found: First, the ingestion of alcohol would be 
followed by its early oxidation in the organ in 
question. Second, if the oxidation capacity of the 
liver is limited this capacity may be overloaded 
by exceeding the physiological limit of alcohol. 
Third, if the oxidation capacity of the liver is 
taxed nearly to its limit, by the oxidation of the 
uric acid xanthins and other toxic substances, the 
ingestion of alcohol may seriously interfere with 



THE LABORATORY VS. NATURE 87 

this protective oxidation by overtaxing the ca- 
pacity. Fourth, if the oxidation capacity is over- 
taxed, an excess of uric acid, xanthin bodies, and 
other toxic substances will get by this portal and 
reach the active tissues of the kidneys. Now all 
of these things take place, so we are forced to the 
conclusion that the oxidation of alcohol is a 
protective oxidation. 

"Alcohol is, therefore, a toxic substance and not 
a food in any sense." 

Propaganda such as this carries weight with the 
layman. He has no means of determining the truth 
or falsity of the conclusions. It "listens well," as 
they say. Like the child's decalcomania, it brings 
out a picture where before there was only a blank, 
and if in the picture we find a purple cow or a green 
cat, his untutored mind is unable to detect the error. 

The thought which the prohibitionists intend to 
convey is that alcohol being a poison is not fit for 
human consumption. Salt also is a poison. Salt 
poisoning is quite common among our domestic 
animals, yet salt is a necessary part of our diet. 
The first question which naturally suggests itself is, 
if alcohol is a poison, why is it produced in the body? 

It must be remembered that physiological chemis- 
try is still in swaddling clothes. Our knowledge of 
the body's processes is very limited and many seem- 



88 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

ing contradictions occur. Take, for instance, the 
problem of the gastric juice. 

The body digests its food by the aid of certain 
juices in the digestive organs. These juices are 
powerful enough to break down the tissue of any 
flesh with which they may come in contact. Why, 
then, are they not dangerous to the body itself? 
Some animals devour their own species. A pack of 
hungry wolves has been known to fall upon a 
wounded comrade and completely devour it, includ- 
ing its digestive apparatus. If the gastric juice is 
strong enough to break down tissue of the digestive 
organs of another creature, why does it not have the 
same effect upon the stomach that produces it? 
Why does not the body digest itself? The problem 
may seem quite formidable until we consider the 
great resistance of the living cell. It is this resist- 
ance which withstands the action of the gastric juice, 
as it withstands the toxic effect of salt and alcohol 
when properly used.* 

* To illustrate the great vitality of the living cell, it may 
be noted that laboratory investigations have provided a 
method of showing that the life of the tissues may be 
preserved even after these have been removed from the^ body. 
Dr. Carrel has demonstrated {Journal of Experimental 
Medicine, May I, 1912) that by washing cultures of con- 
nective tissue in Ringer's solution and then placing them in 
a new medium the growth was accelerated, senility prevented 
and the duration of life greatly prolonged. Some of the 



THE LABORATORY VS. NATURE 89 

The best evidence that alcohol is necessary to the 
human economy is the fact that the body obtains a 
supply through the alcoholic fermentation of sugar 
and other carbohydrates, which takes place in the 
intestines. The digestive process separates the fit 
from the unfit. Alcoholic fermentation is a purify- 
ing process. It eliminates much that is harmful in 
the natural fruit juices. A pure light wine is a 
healthier beverage than unfermented grape juice, 
sweet cider or the fruit juices of the soda water 
fountain. Many of the arguments which the pro- 
hibitionists use so freely against alcoholic beverages 
could be applied with greater consistency against the 
so-called temperance drinks. Anyone who has 
watched alcoholic fermentation in light wines or beer 
will probably agree that it were better to have this 
take place outside the body instead of in the vital 
organs. 

Let us look on the subject from nature's stand- 
point. The most primitive forms of alcoholic bev- 
erages are the wines pressed from grapes, apples and 
other fruits. In our forefathers' time, and until 
labor-saving devices in manufacture and transporta- 
tion had commercialized wine-making, these wines 
were produced in the homes throughout America. 

cultures were living at the beginning of the third month of 
their life in vitro. (See "The Immortality of the Cells and 
Tissues": Medical Record, May 11, 1912.) 



90 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

The harvest feast of Thanksgiving found the house- 
wife bringing to the table her cider, or currant, 
blackberry and grape wines, along with the turkey, 
the mince pies and other evidences of her culinary 
skill. Cider-making is still familiar enough to most 
of us, so that we may observe nature's guiding hand 
in the process and see how she has planned for our 
welfare. 

Cider is made from the juice of the ripe apple. 
The same juice is obtained when the apple is eaten, 
but the fruit contains a lot of bulky roughage which, 
by filling the stomach, limits the amount of fresh 
juice that can be absorbed in this way. At harvest 
time, when the juice is first pressed, the cider is 
sweet. But here again nature steps in to prevent 
over-indulgence, for the juice remains in this condi- 
tion only until fermentation, which begins immedi- 
ately, has done its work. Man has been able to 
kill the germs of ferment by heating or by the intro- 
duction of benzoate of soda or other chemicals, and 
thus preserve the juice in its unfermented form 
throughout the year. But that this was contrary 
to nature's purpose is clearly discernible if we follow 
the process of wine-making. 

Let us suppose the juice has been pressed and 
carefully strained and that we have a clear sweet 
cider (or grape must). This is placed in a barrel. 
In from twenty-four to twenty-eight hours it will 



THE LABORATORY VS. NATURE 91 

commence to work and a frothy mucilaginous scum 
will rise in a sticky mass through the bunghole. 
This frothy scum will be filled with yeast and paren- 
chyma and other impurities. This is the first effect 
of fermentation and is called by the wine-makers 
"purging." It is followed immediately by a less 
tumultuous, effervescent fermentation with a rise in 
temperature, which continues until all the saccharines 
have been turned into alcohol. 

We have an ocular demonstration of nature's 
efforts to purify her beverage in the column of froth 
which rises through the bunghole. When fermenta- 
tion is completed, what has been accomplished is 
apparent not only to the eyes but to the palate also. 
The reader has doubtless often noticed the dregs at 
the bottom of a bottle of wine or ale. The small 
percentage of impurities to be found in a bottle of 
wine which has been carefully drawn off from the 
cask to avoid disturbing the liquid, is as nothing com- 
pared to the murky mass of lees deposited at the 
bottom of the barrel in the process of fermentation. 
And these are in addition to the impurities which 
are purged through the bunghole. If the lees are 
disturbed the wine becomes cloudy and bitter, and to 
drink it would bring on intestinal disturbances which 
would soon convince the experimenter that the whole 
juice of the fruit was only intended by nature to be 
partaken of at harvest time. In guarding against 



92 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

over-indulgence in the fruit juices, nature has com- 
pleted her work by providing the matured wine with 
alcohol, which, by causing intoxication, raises the 
danger signal for those who would imbibe too freely. 
Let us hear what one of our dietitians has to say 
on the subject: 

"Alcohol is made through fermentation and 
distillation, and both these processes would be 
impossible without sugar. When we understand 
this, we find that we can make alcohol by simply 
eating sugar, because this alkaline substance com- 
ing in contact with the hydrochloric acid of our 
stomach, ferments quickly and causes as much 
stimulation to our nerves as though we partook 
of the prefermented article in the shape of light 
beers or wines. 

"Everybody is familiar nowadays with the 
usage of giving sugar to soldiers before they go 
into battle, or of giving sugar to athletes. But 
how few people know that this article of food 
is given to these people because it creates an al- 
cohol which is taken up by the nervous system 
more quickly than the prefermented alcohol in 
the shape of wine or beer ! A good pair of kid- 
neys eliminates the prefermented article very 
quickly, not so the fermenting one. 

"A simple knowledge of how wine is made 



THE LABORATORY VS. NATURE 93 

will explain this question to the reader more 
fully. Wine is made by crushing fruit, vegetables 
or grains, and allowing the natural sugar of these 
foods to ferment. In order to hasten the process 
we add cane sugar and water, and let this stand 
in a warm place until fermentation has brought 
to the surface all waste products, leaving a clear, 
watery fluid, according to the ingredients of which 
it is made. 

"The alcohol made in this manner is concen- 
trated before it even enters the stomach, and 
through its very density is eliminated much more 
quickly than when we depend on the stomach itself 
to perform the process of fermentation. The tee- 
totaller, without realizing it, creates his stimulant. 
Lacking the immediate pleasing effect of alco- 
holics, he generally turns into a dyspeptic grouch 
— much more objectionable than his friend who, 
admitting he wants a stimulant, partakes of a glass 
of beer or light wine, and thereby draws his 
nervous energy to his stomach. This friend might 
be accused of a little undue conviviality, but cer- 
tainly he becomes more human than his grouchy 
sick friend. 

"It must be understood that I am not advocat- 
ing the use of alcohol, but wish rather to explode 
the mistaken notion that alcoholics are the only 
stimulants. Harm comes from partaking of al- 



94 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

cohol in moderation only when the function of 
the kidneys is impaired, and all liquor should 
be excluded from the dietary in such cases. But 
how much more should sugar be excluded! 

"Sugar is present in all fruits, vegetables and 
grains, and such sugar of course should be used. 
But the concentrated sweetness of sugar cane, 
figs, dates and bananas should be used only in 
moderation because, next to the oxygen we 
breathe, sugar is the strongest stimulant there is. 

"Next to sugar, alcohol is strongest in brandy 
and whisky, and these strong liquors should also 
be avoided, leaving for consideration the light 
wines and beer. The latter is a liquor originally 
brewed in Germany, and the English people, brew- 
ing it in a slightly different manner, manufacture 
ale and porter instead. The foundations of these 
drinks are hops and malt. The latter is a product 
made by steeping, drying and concentrating grain, 
which may be either peas, beans or wheat. 

"The water in beer is distilled, and the per- 
centage of alcohol is so small that it cannot be 
objected to by anyone who thoroughly under- 
stands the manufacture of it. Every human being 
has his idiosyncrasies, and there are people whose 
kidneys are not normal, to whom beer might be 
harmful, but to such people meat and sugar are 



THE LABORATORY VS. NATURE 95 

even more harmful, and the discredit should not 
all be given to beer. 

"The average teetotaller clothes himself with 
the 'mantle of righteousness' because he doesn't 
drink alcoholic stimulants. Then he turns into 
the next drug store to have some soft drink or 
candies, by which he injures himself tenfold as 
much as by drinking any of the light liquors. 

"Most soft drinks are flavored with syrups, and 
I have already shown how we manufacture al- 
cohol in our stomachs when we eat sweets. All 
sweets turn into an acid, causing fermentation. 
They set up diseases more quickly than if we 
were to partake of the already manufactured al- 
coholic beverages such as light beer and wine." * 

That alcohol in some form is necessary to the 
human system cannot be doubted. There is one way 
and one way only by which prohibition could be 
accomplished, and that is by tearing down and re- 
building the human machine. If, as science has been 
able to demonstrate, this machine has been evolved 
through countless steps of evolution from a lower 
stratum of animal life, it might be possible through 
other countless steps so to change it that alcohol 
would no longer be essential for its proper function- 
ing. That this is not beyond the bounds of plausi- 

* "Triangle of Health"; Arnold, p. 129. 



96 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

bility, we have as evidence the other earthly crea- 
tures which apparently exist in health and vigor with 
little dependence on this gift of nature. The lower 
we descend in the scale of animal life, the less re- 
quirement there is for alcohol. The fish, the frog, 
the lizard, the snake and other cold-blooded crea- 
tures are familiar examples. Yet it may be that 
alcohol, like oxygen, is one of the immutable essen- 
tials for the animal kingdom. At any rate, no animal 
capable of free locomotion can dispense with it al- 
together. They may use very little, but some they 
must have. Possibly the oyster and clam are com- 
plete abstainers and represent the ideals of prohibi- 
tion at their highest point. Yet their existence 
scarcely commends itself as a goal for human aspira- 
tion. Whatever evolution brought us from, we have 
the habit of preferring to go forward rather than 
back. We are content to follow the purposes of 
Providence so far as we can glimpse them. And 
though there are doubtless some zealous reformers 
who believe that if they had the directing of the 
universe they could produce a better race and a 
better world, most of us are willing to take creation 
as we find it. 



CHAPTER XIV 

THE FOOD VALUE OF ALCOHOL 

The food and medical values of alcohol have a 
very close relation to each other. Proper nourish- 
ment is the foundation of health. The body, by its 
own efforts, is able to overcome disease in most 
instances, if it can obtain and assimilate its natural 
food. 

What is food? Stedman's Medical Dictionary 
gives: "Food. Anglo-Saxon Foda, aliment, nour- 
ishment, what is eaten to supply the necessary nutri- 
tive elements. — Nutritive. Nutrition. Latin 
Nutrire, to nourish. A function of living plants and 
animals consisting in the taking in and assimilation 
through chemical changes (metabolism) of material 
whereby tissue is built up and energy liberated; its 
successive stages are known as digestion, absorption, 
assimilation, and excretion; in highly organized 
animals digestion is preceded by mastication and 
deglutition, and excretion is effected by expiration, 
perspiration, urination and defecation." These 
functions are carried on by the various organs of the 
body, under the control of the nervous system, of 
which the brain is the head. 

97 



98 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Foods may be divided into two classes: those 
which primarily produce tissue and energy, and those 
which enable the organs to function. This is a simple 
rather than a strictly scientific way of putting the 
matter, because all foods serve both purposes. But 
the foods in the first class go more directly into the 
production of tissue and energy, while those in the 
second class work, in a measure, indirectly. For 
example : Digestion is under the control of the gas- 
tric! nerves. Food, producing tissue and energy, 
also creates nerve force — nerve force makes possible 
digestion, assimilation and elimination. Foods like 
alcohol, by their effect on the nervous system, aid 
assimilation and are therefore indirectly assisting in 
building tissue and energy. The human body is 
often likened to an engine. To carry the simile 
further, the foods of the first class may be regarded 
ks the gas or steam which produces the driving force, 
while the foods of the second class are the oils which 
effect the lubrication. Of these, alcohol is the most 
important. To deprive the body of its necessary 
amount of alcohol will have the immediate effect of 
lowering its energy-producing power. Some systems 
require more alcohol than others, and to attempt the 
artificial regulation of this necessity because it some- 
times produces intoxication, is about as sensible as 
to ask the motorist to give up the use of lubricating 
oil because it occasionally works into the cylinders. 



THE FOOD VALUE OF ALCOHOL 99 

In infancy the body obtains its supply of alcohol 
from milk sugar. The new-born babe begins acquir- 
ing the alcohol habit with the first drop of milk it 
takes from its mother's breast — the habit of manu- 
facturing alcohol for its body's needs. As the child 
develops, more alcohol is required, and a taste for 
sweets and candies develops. The need for alcohol 
is never more plainly demonstrated than at this stage 
of our existence. The healthy, romping child eats, 
with the greatest eagerness, all kinds) of cakes, 
candies, ice cream and other sweets. The result is 
an exuberance of high spirits and muscular activity, 
while the child with a weak digestion, who must of 
necessity control his desire for sweets, is sickly and 
unable to play and romp like other children. 

During the early years of childhood the body, 
except under abnormal conditions, obtains all the 
alcohol it requires from the sugars and starches of its 
daily diet. If we could go through life as children, 
playing and exercising without restraint, and without 
the strain of labor and responsibility, it would be un- 
necessary to add to our alcohol supply by other 
means, except when disease or some unusual occur- 
rence made it advisable. But with the approach of 
manhood, with its duties and ambitions, comes an 
increased demand on the body, and the alcohol sup- 
ply must be increased. 

This demand, however, does not come to all alike. 



ioo THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

A Samson or a Sandow can lift a hundredweight 
with less exertion than the man whose muscles are 
undeveloped. In the same way the brilliant mind 
can do its thinking with less effort, or less friction, 
than one more sluggish; and while the latter in the 
end may perhaps accomplish just as much, it is at 
the expense of greater labor and a greater tax on 
the system. Mental effort uses up more nervous 
energy than physical labor. The man who sits at a 
desk all the time is often more tired at the end of 
the day's work than the laborer in the fields. There 
is thus a wide variation in the food requirements of 
different individuals, in accordance with physical and 
mental development, occupation and mode of life. 
Any attempt to standardize the daily diet will inevi- 
tably work injustice and will result in many cases of 
malnutrition and the consequent breeding of disease. 
Enforced rationing is dangerous at its best because 
of its effect on the nerves. Let us follow the work- 
ing of the nerves in the digestive process and see 
why alcohol may be necessary for their proper 
functioning. 

The body selects its food by the senses, and their 
messages are transmitted to the brain by the nerves. 
The sight of the bright red apple, the smell of the 
savory dish of bacon, the sweetness of the lump of 
sugar, are all conveyed to the brain over the nerve 
telegraphs. The gustatory and olfactory nerves, 



THE FOOD VALUE OF ALCOHOL 101 

responsible for taste and smell, and the gastric 
nerves, which regulate digestion, are integral parts 
of one system and may be equally affected by outside 
influences. The odors coming through the open 
door of a bakery or cook shop will stimulate the 
appetite or add to the pangs of hunger. The sight 
of blood may have a directly opposite effect. The 
taste of a bad oyster will produce nausea long before 
any toxic action can occur. 

The body adjusts itself to changes of conditions, 
but this adjustment does not take place so rapidly 
as in self-regulating man-made machines. For in- 
stance, to give a concrete case : If a man ordinarily 
engaged in office work should spend a day behind the 
plow or in some other strenuous exercise, he will 
burn up more tissue than his body has been accus- 
tomed to restore at short notice. The consequence 
will be that for three or four days following he will 
be unusually hungry before every meal, and even 
though he eat more food, as he almost certainly will, 
it will not alter the result. 

The body is constantly meeting abnormal condi- 
tions. Disease, fatigue, worry, fear, all have their 
influence on our nervous system, including the gas- 
tric nerves. We often hear the expression u too 
tired to eat." The craving felt for alcohol under 
such circumstances is only nature calling for a food 
which the body must have before it can return to 



102 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

"normalcy." This need may show itself in a desire 
for sweets from which the body can make its own 
alcohol, or in the craving for a drink, according to 
the habits of the individual. Manufactured alcohol 
is preferable because it is more easily assimilated. 
To attempt to obtain alcohol from sugar or starches, 
when the digestive apparatus is worn with fatigue, is 
to invite chronic dyspepsia. 

The reason for the body's craving for alcohol 
under these conditions now seems clear. It has been 
recently demonstrated that alcohol acts as an anti- 
dote to the effect of disease toxins on the nervous 
system, even in the case of some toxins which cause 
permanent impairment. If alcohol will thus counter- 
act the more serious toxins of disease, it seems only 
reasonable to suppose that it will have the same effect 
in the case of fatigue toxins. Much evidence has 
already been produced to support this conclusion, 
which fits in so perfectly with the known facts about 
alcohol that there can be little doubt about its cor- 
rectness. This, then, is the logical explanation of 
the stimulating effect of alcohol, in itself a depres- 
sant. 

There is another side to the question of the food 
value of alcohol, which is generally ignored in the 
arguments of the prohibitionists. Alcoholic bever- 
ages, particularly the malt liquors, contain other 
nutrients which, in combination with alcohol, form 



THE FOOD VALUE OF ALCOHOL 103 

an easily digested and highly beneficial diet. We do 
not make three square meals a day from salt alone 
nor do we drink pure alcohol. Many of the argu- 
ments against alcoholic liquors can certainly be 
modified to take into account the additional nutrients 
which these beverages contain. 



CHAPTER XV 

ALCOHOL AS A MEDICINE 

There is no drug in the whole pharmacopoeia 
which has been more generally employed or has had 
a wider field of usefulness than alcohol. Its medici- 
nal value was recognized by Biblical and other early 
writers : 

"Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, 
And wine unto those that be of heavy hearts." 

Proverbs xxxi : 6. 

Its use as a therapeutic agent goes back indeed to 
prehistoric times, where, naturally, we cannot now 
follow it. But it seems more than probable that 
alcohol originally taught mankind the value of drugs 
in the treatment of disease. We can easily conceive 
the feeling with which sickness was regarded by 
primitive man, as a visitation beyond control. The 
sense of warmth and well-being which alcohol pro- 
duces may certainly have led our interesting ancestors 
to make their first attempts at medical treatment. 

To-day, alcohol is as highly regarded for its 
medicinal qualities, except by a portion of one med- 
ical cult, as it ever was. Yet it has been placed by 

stringent legislation quite beyond the reach of the 

104 



ALCOHOL AS A MEDICINE 105 

ordinary individual, unless he is prepared to break 
the law. The first law of nature is self-preserva- 
tion, which is usually considered higher than man- 
made laws, even though these are the laws of our 
own country. If alcohol is necessary to maintain 
life, no statutes, and no methods of enforcement, will 
ever be able to prevent its use. 

A little knowledge is proverbially a dangerous 
thing. It is the hasty, superficial half-knowledge of 
the laboratory that has condemned alcohol. For- 
tunately, we do not live in the laboratory; and the 
theories that are born there are of little value unless 
they can be applied to the betterment of our daily 
life. Before this can be done, we must have a 
fuller, clearer knowledge of the human body. What 
we think we know has only led to confusion. Thus 
we find alcohol is a depressant, yet it stimulates. It 
is a nerve sedative, yet it produces nerve force. It 
retards the action of the digestive ferments, yet it 
aids digestion. It is no tissue builder, yet it adds 
to the body's weight. It lowers the body's tempera- 
ture, yet it warms the body. It dulls men's wits, yet 
it increases the activity of thought and speech. It 
induces sleep, yet it will keep the faculties awake. 
It may lower the capacity of the individual worker, 
yet it increases labor's output. Itself a poison, it 
protects against more serious poisons. There is 
probably no drug more complex in its physiological 



106 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

action than alcohol. On account of its great power 
for good and evil, it may well be considered the 
Jekyll and Hyde of the pharmacopoeia. Hare sums 
up the pros and cons as follows : 

"Clinical experience, too great to be ignored, 
stands for the continued employment of the drug. 
The drug does not act as a stimulant in the or- 
dinary sense of the term, but nevertheless read- 
justs the circulation by dilating the peripheral 
vessels and influences the protective powers of the 
body by affecting the blood-cells or the blood- 
serum or the lymph. This belief seems to find 
support by reason of experiments carried out by 
the author, in which he was able to show that 
alcohol produces a distinct increase in the bacteri- 
olytic power of the blood in disease, probably by 
increasing the activity of the complemental 
body."* 

Like many of the things which nature has pro- 
duced, alcohol will lose its power for harm as soon 
as we are able to dispel the ignorance which still 
surrounds it. Much has already been accomplished, 
and now that prohibition has become a national 
issue the work will unquestionably be completed. So 
there will be at any rate one good result of the 

* "Practical Therapeutics" ; Seventeenth Edition, p. 76. 



ALCOHOL AS A MEDICINE 107 

attempt at prohibition: we shall have a better 
knowledge of alcohol. 

The science of medicine is passing through a 
transition period. The old theory of symptomatic 
treatment is being abandoned. The physician of 
to-day no longer treats the symptom where it is 
possible to strike at the cause. Alcohol may or may 
not be a heart stimulant. It may equalize circula- 
tion. It may have the property of sparing tissue. 
But all these are of secondary importance. To pass 
the test of modern medicine we must be able to show 
that alcohol will assist the body to remove the cause 
of disease. This has now been definitely established, 
with the result that the whole structure of the pro- 
hibitionist's arguments against the use of alcohol in 
medicine has fallen like a house of cards. 

Our knowledge of disease, and by this is meant 
infectious disease, has been brought to a point where 
we are able to classify and distinguish between the 
various forms of germ life in much the same way as 
we classify the different forms of terrestrial life. 
Just as we divide the latter into beasts, birds and 
fishes, so the former are classified as necroparasites, 
semiparasites, true parasites and tissue parasites. 
Of these, the first two produce toxins. The necro- 
parasites possess a low grade of infectiousness, that 
is, of the power to multiply and spread through the 
body, but they cause death by their highly fatal 



io8 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

poisons. The germs may be unable to maintain 
themselves in normal tissue, but their toxins are 
powerful enough to kill, even after the germs them- 
selves have ceased to exist. On the other hand, 
the semiparasites are highly infectious and aggres- 
sive and multiply rapidly in the system. Their 
poisons are less deadly, but continued production of 
the toxins may prove fatal. These are the germs 
with which we have to deal in influenza and many of 
our serious diseases. 

With the production of a practical germicide, it is 
now possible to stamp out these infectious semi- 
parasites at any period of the disease, unless, of 
course, the case has gone altogether too far for 
curative treatment. Under the most favorable cir- 
cumstances, when the germicide is given by mouth, 
the germs can be destroyed in from twelve to four- 
teen hours. Thus it has been possible to measure 
the effect of the toxins on the various organs of the 
body. Exhaustive experiments were carried on in 
influenza and semiparasitic animal infections in 
which many thousand cases were treated. In the 
course of these experiments it developed that the 
effect of the toxins on the gastric nerves sometimes 
results in complete suspension of the digestive 
functions. Of course this was nothing new. Loss 
of appetite indicates impaired digestion. A sick 
animal does not eat because his instinct teaches him 



ALCOHOL AS A MEDICINE 109 

that it is useless to put food in his stomach to putrefy 
if he is to derive no benefit from it. But these ex- 
periments were a conclusive corroboration. They 
were carried on as follows : 

The germicide was given by mouth. Results 
could be expected in from twelve to fourteen hours 
if digestion was not impaired. If no results were 
obtained, the germicide was given by intravenous 
injection, which, in most cases, proved effective. In 
an attempt to clear up the gastric disturbance, alcohol 
was given with the germicide and an immediate ab- 
sorption was obtained, the case responding at once 
and thus demonstrating that alcohol acts as an anti- 
dote to the effect of the toxins on the digestive or- 
gans. To grasp the importance of this fact we must 
understand how the body forms its antibodies. 

The cells are the active basis of all animal and 
vegetable organization. According to Ehrlich's 
side-chain theory, which is the best conception of the 
phenomenon, a cell is composed of a central nucleus 
upon which its life and activity depend. Attached 
to the nucleus are a variable number of subsidiary 
mouths or receptors (side chains) by which the nutri- 
tion of the cell is regulated. These receptors differ 
from each other in certain chemical affinities, accord- 
ing to the nature of the food molecules to be ab- 
sorbed by the cells. The many different body cells 
(for example, the blood cells, the nerve cells, the 



no THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

muscle cells), varying in nutritional requirements, 
account for a considerable variation in the receptors. 
Ehrlich conceived that toxin molecules may acci- 
dentally possess the same affinity for certain recep- 
tors as the food molecules which the latter are ac- 
customed to receive under normal conditions. To 
the possibility that different disease germs are at- 
tracted by a different set of side chains is attributed 
the specific immunity which follows various infec- 
tions. When infection occurs the germ or its toxin 
becomes affixed to a receptor with the result that not 
only is the cell deprived of necessary nourishment, but 
injury or complete destruction may also follow. The 
cell rids itself of this condition by casting off the re- 
ceptor, and its loss stimulates regenerative cell activ- 
ity to replace the damage. According to Weigert's 
law of regeneration, the defect in the cell structure 
is repaired beyond the necessary measure. Each 
individual receptor which the cell loses is replaced 
by numerous mouths, of which the fittest will remain 
with the mother cell, the remainder being cast off 
into the blood circulation, where they act as anti- 
bodies. The same law of regeneration is common 
in the vegetable kingdom. If a limb is removed 
from a tree, many small branches will spring forth 
to supply the requirements of the roots, the most 
favored branch crowding off the others, just as in 
the case of the new mouths which the cell produces 



ALCOHOL AS A MEDICINE in 

without intending to retain them all. The free re- 
ceptors thrown off into the circulation (antibodies) 
retain their affinity for the germs and their toxins. 
They combine with these, and thus putting an end 
to their activities, render them harmless. All this 
is dependent on the cells receiving their accustomed 
nourishment from the digestive organs. When this 
is cut off not only are the cells weakened, but even 
the incentive to form new mouths no longer exists, 
since there is no food to fill them, no work for them 
to do. Thus we see that alcohol, by its antitoxic 
action on the digestive organs, may be the saving fac- 
tor which enables the body to form the protective 
antibodies which are its main defence against 
disease. 

In the summer of 191 8, when influenza, which 
had broken out in Europe in virulent form, was 
threatening invasion, but before the great pandemic 
had actually reached our shores, the records of these 
experiments were laid before the Medical Section of 
the Council of National Defence at Washington. 
It was not long before the disease found its fatal 
way here, and it soon became epidemic. The concen- 
tration camps were among the first to suffer from its 
ravages. After every other treatment had failed, 
alcohol in the form of whisky was resorted to. There 
was an immediate drop in the death-rate. One 
young buddy who was driving the dead wagon in a 



ii2 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

southern camp tells the story that his nightly load of 
forty coffins was reduced to three or four through 
the introduction of the whisky treatment. Stories 
like this continued to come from the camps, but no 
move was made on the part of the American Medi- 
cal Association to modify its resolution against 
alcohol, although the work amongst the soldiers was 
in charge of high officials of the association and 
they were daily receiving proof of the value of al- 
cohol in the treatment of disease. But the Eight- 
eenth Amendment had not yet been approved by 
the Supreme Court and, if the truth were known, 
it might nullify all the work which the organization 
had done to further the cause of prohibition. How- 
ever, the public was not slow to appreciate the 
importance of the facts, familiar to them through 
personal experience, the evidence of friends, and the 
columns of the press. 



CHAPTER XVI 

ALCOHOL AND FATIGUE 

From time immemorial alcohol has been used by 
man to counteract the effect of too great mental or 
physical effort, or what we call "fatigue" ; and be- 
cause the body responded to alcohol, and relief was 
obtained, it was looked upon as a stimulant. This 
very natural mistake has been handed down for 
generations. Alcohol is not really a stimulant, as 
we understand the term. The stimulating effect 
which it produces in the tired worker appears to 
be due to its power of acting as an antidote to the 
fatigue toxins. As long as the effect is there, it is a 
matter of little consequence to the ordinary indi- 
vidual how it is brought about. Nevertheless, it 
is of importance to our subject, for to ignorance 
on this point can be traced many of the abuses for 
which alcohol has had to shoulder the blame. 

Fatigue is nature's five o'clock whistle — the signal 
that our day's work should be brought to an end. 
In its daily toil the body burns up a certain amount of 
tissue. This is replaced by the foods we eat, but 
the capacity for replacement is limited by the capac- 
ity of the digestive organs. The waste of tissue, 

"3 



ii4 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

therefore, must also have a limit; and fatigue has 
been provided to warn us when this limit is approach- 
ing. The more we study the human machine, the 
more we find cause to marvel at the Omniscience 
which created it. 

Our knowledge of fatigue is still very limited. 
In 1904 Weichardt announced that he had discov- 
ered a specific substance, a fatigue toxin, which he 
claimed was the chief cause of fatigue, and against 
which the body was able to produce an antitoxin. 
To test this theory, Lee and Aronovitch (Depart- 
ment of Physiology, Columbia University, N. Y.) 
instituted a series of experiments. Cats and rab- 
bits were fatigued by running in a revolving wheel. 
After the animals were thoroughly fatigued they 
were killed, the muscles of the hind legs were re- 
moved and the muscle juice extracted. This juice 
was then injected into the peritoneal cavity of guinea 
pigs. As a "control," a similar experiment was 
carried out, the muscle juice of non-fatigued animals 
being used. The results in both cases were some 
disturbance of respiration and an immediate fall of 
temperature. The fall continued from v thirty min- 
utes to an hour and was followed by a slower return 
to normal. Some of the animals died on the fol- 
lowing day. This occurred in the case of the "con- 
trol" animals as well as in those which had been 
treated with the juice from the fatigued muscles. 



ALCOHOL AND FATIGUE 115 

It would therefore appear that there is in the nor- 
mal muscle a substance which, when brought into 
contact with other parts of the body, produces a 
toxic effect. 

The body eliminates its waste tissue through the 
circulatory system. It is carried off in the venous 
blood and is finally emitted by way of the lungs. 
Every muscle is supplied with blood vessels and 
lymphatics. With this information to build on we 
may conclude that the use of the muscles eventually 
releases certain toxic substances which, finding their 
way into the circulation, are the direct cause of 
fatigue. 

We may now go a step further. When the fatigue 
toxin reaches the circulation, an antitoxin is set up. 
Thus we find the individual, let us say the black- 
smith, who uses his muscles regularly in the course 
of his daily work, can do this without being tired. 
On the other hand, the office worker who suddenly 
takes up some strenuous exercise is rapidly fatigued; 
but if he continues the exercise his body will become 
accustomed to it and he will no longer feel fatigued, 
because the antitoxins have been produced. There 
is however a limit to muscular exertion, and when 
this limit is reached the muscles draw on the other 
parts of the body and the nerves become affected. 

The process of mental fatigue is not so clear. We 
know that the nerves can be trained to withstand a 



n6 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

certain amount of strain, just as our muscles can be 
trained. But it is apparent that the brain cannot be 
used — or at any rate is not so used in ordinary life — 
with the same regularity as the muscles of the work- 
man. The bricklayer performs the same task day 
after day, while the business man may be suddenly 
called upon, after a week of routine, to decide some 
momentous question which will require the best 
thought of which he is capable. If from this effort 
antitoxins are set up, they are gradually eliminated 
until some new crisis brings a reproduction. The 
manual worker, for his part, may suffer another form 
of mental fatigue. A common case is the fatigue 
which is the result of monotony of employment or 
environment. American industries have been stand- 
ardized to a great extent. A job which necessitates 
doing the same thing over and over again, attending 
interminably to the same detail, affords no mental 
relaxation. The mechanic who bores the same-sized 
hole in wood or metal thousands of times during the 
work-week becomes subject to a nervous strain, which 
may be more or less severe according to the dis- 
position and habits of the individual. A country 
boy, coming from a farm where the work and sur- 
roundings are varied and entering upon a job of this 
sort within the four blank walls of a machine shop, 
will feel the strain more than the experienced mill 
hand. Monotony such as this may be described as 



ALCOHOL AND FATIGUE 117 

a passive monotony in contradistinction from the 
active, aggressive monotony which is forced upon the 
mind of the worker in the never-ending shop noises 
or eyestrains — the steam hammer of the boiler shop, 
the whir of machinery, the dizzying revolution of 
wheels, and so on. The wearing effect of any such 
form of monotonous repetition was recognized by 
the Chinese in one of their well-known punishments 
— the tickling of the soles of the feet until the 
nervous system was completely shattered. 

These are some of the causes of the everyday 
changes which occur within the body and must be 
taken into account in any study of the effect of alcohol 
upon the human system. To make a man the me- 
chanical subject of a laboratory experiment without 
any consideration of his previous history, and feed 
him alcohol in the hope of obtaining accurate data 
as to the effect of the drug, is merely ridiculous. 

Here is a simple test which the reader, if he is 
accustomed to using alcohol in moderation, can make 
for himself. If he has spent a quiet morning, with 
nothing to disturb his physical or mental poise, let 
him take a drink of alcoholic liquor — a cocktail or 
whisky — at luncheon time. In a very short while 
the slight feeling of exhilaration will wear off, and 
in its place will come a feeling of depression. Let 
him, however, take the same drink before his evening 
meal — -after a hard day's physical or mental labor — 



n8 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

and there will be a sustained feeling of stimulation. 
Where alcohol is taken to overcome the effect of 
fatigue, depression iseldom follows; for just as 
alcohol will counteract fatigue, so the fatigue toxins 
seem to prevent the depressant action of alcohol. 

Have you ever noticed how much more easily the 
manual worker becomes intoxicated than the man 
who works with his brain? The fatigue antitoxins 
which physical labor sets up appear to be more con- 
stant than those which may be produced by mental 
effort. Consequently, in the steady manual worker 
there is little to offset the intoxicating effect of 
alcohol. There are many instances to show the 
slight effect alcohol will have on those who are under- 
going severe mental strain. A colonel of artillery 
in one of the armies of the Allies tells the story that, 
during the German drive for the Channel Ports in 
the spring of 191 8, he and his officers on some days 
drank a quart of Scotch whisky apiece with no more 
effect than if it had been so much water. A farm 
hand may become intoxicated on three per cent, cider, 
because his work does not cause mental strain. A 
mill hand may drink with impunity on Friday night 
an amount of alcohol which, if taken on Monday 
after his day of rest, would make him drunk. 

One of the strongest arguments for prohibition 
was the harm done by the corner saloon. A large 
part of the saloon patronage came from the laboring 



ALCOHOL AND FATIGUE 119 

classes. Their ignorance of the proper use of alcohol 
often led to excesses, and thus the saloon became a 
public nuisance. Would it not have been better to 
attempt to dispel some of the ignorance which has 
surrounded alcohol than to attempt to enforce a 
nation-wide prohibition which is bound to result in 
failure? The question has already been answered 
by the disastrous results which followed war-time 
prohibition and are now emphasizing the contempt- 
of-nature provisions of the Eighteenth Amendment. 
So many arguments and data have been advanced 
to show the harmful effects of alcohol that the reader 
will doubtless require on the other side more than 
the mere theory of the value of alcohol as related to 
fatigue. Some years ago the subject was brought 
home very forcibly to the author, and as a result a 
series of observations was undertaken to determine 
the value of alcohol as an antidote for fatigue in 
athletics. For this purpose (to say nothing of other 
purposes) no sport can equal golf. The golf stroke 
itself, from the short put to the full stroke, requires 
the most exact coordination of mind and muscle. 
During the swing the head of the club travels varying 
distances, from a few inches to over twenty feet. 
The most perfect rhythm must be observed, the club 
head travelling at its maximum speed just as it comes 
in contact with the ball. While the player may make 
his strokes instinctively, nevertheless every oppor- 



120 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

tunity is given for mature deliberation and a fault 
which may spoil one stroke can be corrected at the 
next. Thirty-six holes of golf require about six 
hours of physical effort, and there is no greater 
mental strain in any sport than can be found on the 
putting green when the match is close and the prize 
worth winning. In the full stroke the value of mus- 
cular power is fully demonstrated. The three-quar- 
ter and half strokes and the wrist shots supply a 
perfect test of mental control. To apply the proper 
speed to the club head, to play a ball from a cuppy 
lie and drop it within a few feet of a hole one hun- 
dred and thirty yards away, is a test of delicacy of 
touch which will compare favorably with the finest 
laboratory measurements. The results are all set 
forth accurately on the score card. 

In the observations made for comparative pur- 
poses, many prominent golfers unwittingly took part. 
The results were almost invariably the same. Where 
a moderate amount of alcohol was taken at luncheon 
time, the play of the afternoon compared more favor- 
ably with the morning round than where total absti- 
nence was observed. If more than enough alcohol 
to counteract the fatigue of the morning were taken, 
the toxic effect of the drug could be seen in the falling 
off of the play. The following scores, with the 
distances, are submitted to demonstrate to our labo- 



ALCOHOL AND FATIGUE 121 

ratory friends that a man may still take a cocktail 
occasionally without impairing his efficiency. 

Golfer No. i Date: July 8, 1906 

Alcohol. One Martini cocktail, one Scotch high- 
ball : approximately 45 cubic centimetres. 

Conditions. No golf for two weeks previous to 
day of score. Morning round mediocre, score not 
kept. 

123456789 Total 
Distance 427 276 106 240 580 555 396 210 155 

Score 54246 5443 37 

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 
Distance 300 344 309 275 382 470 255 140 260 

Score 544455433 37 

74 

This score established an amateur record for the 
course. As every golfer knows, the mental strain 
increases towards the end of a record score, which 
one misplay may spoil. 

Golfer No. 2 Date: October 22, 19 16 

Alcohol. Two Martini cocktails, one Bass' Ale : 
approximately 75 cubic centimetres. 

Conditions. Eighteen holes played the afternoon 
before. No golf on the five previous days. 

123456789 Total 
Distance 212 312 326 140 540 606 640 180 350 

Morning 354366745 43 

Afternoon 344355634 37 



122 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

IO II 12 13 14 15 l6 17 l8 

Distance 380 360 455 565 280 150 363 120 225 

Morning .556543534 40 
Afternoon 5 4 6xxxxxxi5 

Total for Morning 83 
Total for Afternoon 52 

This score was made in the finals of a club cham- 
pionship, which fact formed the mental hazard. The 
match ended with a victory on the twelfth green. 
An interesting sidelight is that on the same day the 
year before the same contestants met in the finals of 
the same championship. For that occasion the 
scorer had been on a training-table diet for two 
months and played the whole match without alcoholic 
stimulation. In the morning round he recorded an 
eighty-two, but in the afternoon he began dropping 
strokes and was finally defeated on the fourteenth 
green, his score showing ten strokes worse than the 
one recorded here. 

From these and a great many similar records it 
seems clear that when alcohol is taken only in suffi- 
cient quantity to offset the effect of fatigue, it does 
not interfere with accuracy of performance or the 
will to win. 



CHAPTER XVII 

FATIGUE AND DISEASE 

The craving for alcohol which fatigue produces is 
a natural craving, that is to say, the body is only 
expressing a demand for something which it really 
needs and for which it will be the better, once it has 
been obtained. Fatigue is a very real cause of 
bodily impairment. How serious a factor it may 
become is now fully recognized. Sleep is the sover- 
eign remedy, but as an emergency treatment alcohol 
supplies the most effective antidote. Sleep is not 
always obtainable when it is most needed; the slug- 
gard may be drowsy with over-indulgence, while 
the keen worker and keen brain, the strained and 
exhausted nerves, may look in vain for nature's 
quiet hand to knit up "the ravell'd sleave of care." 
Or time may press; we cannot leave our work un- 
finished and go calmly to bed; the task, whatever it 
may be, must be finished, and finished efficiently. We 
have only twenty-four hours a day to live on, as 
Arnold Bennett points out; and sometimes alcohol, 
used with judgment, will enable us to get and give 
full value for every one of the twenty-four. To 

withhold alcohol under conditions which clearly call 

123 



i2 4 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

for its use, is a very serious responsibility. The 
prohibitionists may affect to ignore this responsibility, 
but they lay themselves open to the specific charge of 
making their own profit through others' loss. In 
this connection one may properly point out that in 
spite of its resolution professing to condemn alcohol 
absolutely under all conditions, the American Med- 
ical Association permits its members to make an 
enormous profit through their monopoly of prescrib- 
ing alcohol for medical purposes. A little more 
outward consistency might at any rate be expected. 

Fatigue may cause injury by its direct effect upon 
the system, or it may act indirectly by lowering our 
powers of resistance and thus lay the system open to 
attack by the germs of disease. One of our leading 
American pathologists has expressed his firm convic- 
tion that in the course of time fatigue would be 
recognized as one of the main causes of disease; 
and Sir James Paget is quoted as writing: "You will 
find that fatigue has a larger share in the promotion 
or transmission of disease than any other single 
causal condition you can name."* Nervous prostra- 
tion and other similar affections are examples of the 
direct effect of fatigue. The disastrous ending of 
Mr. Wilson's Western speaking tour in favor of 
the League of Nations showed how serious may be 

* "The Human Machine and Industrial Efficiency" ; Lee, 
p. 79. 



FATIGUE AND DISEASE 125 

the effects of fatigue caused by great mental and 
physical effort following a long period of overwork. 
If the President, to set an example to the nation in 
the observance of war-time prohibition, deprived 
himself of necessary alcoholic stimulation, he was a 
victim of the ignorance which brought this measure 
upon the country, and his misfortune can never be 
wholly repaired now. It is so easy to destroy, so 
hard to rebuild. But valuable as alcohol may be in 
such emergencies, to arrest destructive action and re- 
store the equilibrium of the system, we find its 
greatest usefulness in the relief of the lighter cases 
of fatigue-strain, which, if persisted in, will lower 
our powers of resistance and impair our physical 
fitness. Every athletic trainer knows the danger of 
getting his squad too "fine." Overtraining is the 
result of a greater effort than the recuperative powers 
of the body can take care of, the cumulative effect of 
a small surplus of fatigue produced daily or at fre- 
quent intervals, with the consequent injurious action 
on the body. 

The individual cannot stand alone. His physical 
deterioration is a menace to the whole community. 
We are only just beginning to understand the mean- 
ing of virulence in infectious disease. It is possible 
to breed the germs of disease and increase their 
natural powers precisely as we are able to improve 
the breed of our draft horses or dairy cows. Nour- 



126 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

ishment and congenial surroundings are the founda- 
tions of this improvement. In the impaired body, 
which is able to offer only a weak resistance to the 
progress of an infection, the organisms of disease 
find a host altogether too hospitable; they feel 
happily at home and are able to attain their highest 
development. A little care, an ounce of prevention, 
— in cases such as this an ounce or so of alcohol, — 
would have saved the proverbial pound of cure. Yet 
how often do we hear the expression, "Prohibition 
means nothing to me, I never drink alcoholic 
liquors"? The man whose life runs so smoothly 
that he never needs manufactured alcohol may or 
may not be a fortunate individual, but he will find 
that prohibition, if enforced, will have for him a very 
real meaning on account of the malnutrition it will 
be responsible for among his neighbors whose need 
for alcohol is distinctly different from his. 

The great influenza pandemic already referred 
to,* which reached this country in the late summer of 
19 1 8, is an example of the serious conditions which 
are to be expected as a natural consequence of fatigue 
and malnutrition. For four years Europe had been 
undergoing the physical and mental strain of the 
greatest war in history. In most of the belligerent 
countries, control of foodstuffs was resorted to and 
laws were passed reducing the consumption of 

* See Chapter XV. 



FATIGUE AND DISEASE 127 

alcoholic beverages. While it is too much to say, 
with so many conditions favoring disease, that de- 
priving the workers of necessary alcohol was the 
primary cause of the scourge, nevertheless it is a 
factor which cannot be ignored. If more attention 
had been paid to the study of fatigue and its allevia- 
tion by alcoholic stimulants and other proper mea- 
sures, the sweeping disaster might have been avoided 
or at least minimized. Sixteen months after the 
beginning of the war, the British Committee on the 
Health of Munition Workers gave the following 
picture of conditions in Great Britain : "Taking the 
country as a whole the Committee are bound to 
record their impression that the munition workers in 
general have been allowed to reach a state of reduced 
efficiency and lowered health which might have been 
avoided without reduction of output by attention to 
the details of daily and weekly rests." It is difficult 
to find a more monotonous occupation than the manu- 
facture of munitions. In March, 1917, the Food 
Controller, Lord Devonport, reduced the annual out- 
put of beer in the United Kingdom from 26,000,000 
barrels, which had been allowed for the year ending 
March 31, 1916, to 10,000,000 barrels. Six months 
later the Health of Munition Workers Committee 
wrote : "The conditions are not the same now as 
they were in the early days of the war; not only 
have large numbers of the youngest and strongest 



128 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

workers been withdrawn for military service, but 
those who remain are suffering from the strain in- 
separable from a continuous period of long hours of 
employment. . . . The effects of the strain may 
even have been already more serious than appears on 
the surface, for while it is possible to judge roughly 
the general condition of those working in the factory 
to-day, little information is available concerning the 
large number of workers who, for one reason or 
another, and often because they find the work too 
arduous, are continually giving up their job." In 
many of the other countries the conditions were far 
worse. 

The danger to the health of a community which 
may result from depriving the normal human being 
of alcohol was convincingly demonstrated by our own 
experience during mobilization. When the draft 
called our millions to the colors, it took the pick of 
the nation's manhood. Men in the prime of youth- 
ful vigor were selected after a careful medical exam- 
ination and sent away to the concentration camps. 
It is true that the camps were sometimes crowded, 
but many of these men came from the crowded quar- 
ters of our large cities. It is also true that they 
were unable to choose their own food, but their 
rations were selected by men of experience and should 
not have affected their physical condition adversely. 
The one great dietary change which came to them 



FATIGUE AND DISEASE 129 

when they entered the Army was that they were no 
longer able to obtain the customary alcoholic drink to 
meet their bodily requirements. They were then 
put through a severe course of physical training, and 
in addition to the fatigue produced by this muscular 
exercise, they were continually subject to the mental 
strain of the thought of separation from home and 
family to take part on a foreign soil in the greatest 
war in history. It is no wonder that epidemics broke 
out in these camps, nor is it surprising that the death 
rate from diseases like pneumonia should have been 
two or three times the normal. When we hear 
stories of the great improvement which prohibition 
has wrought in some homes by the reformation of the 
drunken husband, we must think also of the fathers 
and mothers whose sons were carried off in these 
camp epidemics through official ignorance of the 
proper use of alcohol. Drunkenness is a vice, but 
it is curable. No one can cure death. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

THE ECONOMIC SIDE OF PROHIBITION 

Before discussing prohibition more closely from 
the economic standpoint, let us consider some of the 
conditions by which we are surrounded — conditions 
under which we are permitted to exist. We are all 
subject to certain natural laws, — man and beast, fish 
and fowl, insect and plant life. From chaos to the 
present day there has been, it is hoped, a gradual 
improvement in terrestrial life. That this improve- 
ment may go on, nature endeavors to maintain an 
even balance in her dealings with her creatures, so 
that those who by their own efforts rise above the 
general mass may go forward, while those who slip 
back fall finally to oblivion. Where man has gained 
a thorough knowledge of particular conditions, he has 
frequently been able to improve on nature's methods. 
But too often, through a facile enthusiasm born of 
ignorance, he has run counter to nature's purposes 
and has thus been brought to disaster. Take as an 
example some of the legislation designed to protect 
wild life. Bounties have been offered for the de- 
struction of certain predatory birds, because the in- 

130 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 131 

jury they did seemed obvious; yet when they have 
been driven from the locality, it has been found that 
these very outlaws had been keeping down dangerous 
vermin, which became an uncontrollable pest as soon 
as nature's guard had been removed. This leaping 
before looking is typical of prohibition to-day. The 
average temperance worker may have excellent inten- 
tions, but he knows little or nothing about alcohol 
from the scientific side. He has had the usual expe- 
rience — an intemperate friend or acquaintance, some 
information gleaned from police courts or police 
reports, some misinformation absorbed from the 
ranting of an ignorant enthusiast, mistaking denunci- 
ation for demonstration. Yet through organized 
effort the prohibitionists have been able to impose 
their will upon the legislatures of the country and en- 
graft upon the fundamental law a measure which 
should never have passed beyond the dignity of a 
village ordinance. It is an extraordinary case of 
wholesale modern dragooning. But intolerance does 
not cease to be vicious simply because it is exhibited 
on a vast scale. Congress cannot repeal the laws of 
nature. Be sure of one thing : evolution will never 
bring any species down to the level of its unfit. And 
no nation can adopt measures which sacrifice its 
manhood and womanhood for the benefit of its 
drunkards and debauchees and still hold its economic 
position. The country will go forward, but there 



132 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

will be a good deal of wreckage to be cleared out of 
the way. 

A nation's economic position is dependent on — i. 
natural resources; 2. industry; 3. commerce; 4. 
thrift. With industry is included the health and 
efficiency of the workers, and thrift embraces the 
thrift of the people themselves and the conservation 
of the nation's finances and natural resources. Prac- 
tically all national wealth is the result of industry, 
for however favored a nation may be in natural 
resources these can only be brought into marketable 
form as the result of labor. To reap the reward of 
industry, labor's product must be bartered. If a 
nation is able to produce a surplus in excess of its 
own needs, it may add to the national wealth by 
exchanging this surplus for some form of permanent 
property, or for some product which can be produced 
more cheaply abroad, thus releasing labor for more 
remunerative production at home. 

It is still too early to estimate the effect of prohi- 
bition on our industries : first, because of lack of 
effective enforcement, and second because, following 
so closely upon a great world upheaval, during which 
labor's powers of production were taxed to the limit 
with the natural consequence that wages rose with 
the increased demand, many disadvantages which 
might be attributed to prohibition may be due wholly 
or partly to other conditions. It is much easier to 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 133 

disprove the economic arguments of the prohibi- 
tionists than to arrive at definite conclusions on the 
other side from the records now available. It will 
require a long time and a careful study of statistics 
before we shall be able to gauge the full effect of the 
new order of things upon the country. While certain 
outstanding facts may be considered, the question as 
a whole can only be discussed in principle. 

What will be the effect of enforced prohibition 
upon labor? A requirement of primary importance 
for productive industry is that labor must be well and 
suitably fed : because if the body is undernourished, 
its capacity for physical effort is lowered, and because 
starvation, whether sudden or gradual, naturally 
breeds discontent and may lead to revolution in the 
future as in the past. But a man may eat his fill and 
yet starve his body. Any radical change of diet may 
cause malnutrition until the people have accustomed 
themselves to it. Malt liquor has been an important 
part of the laborer's diet. It is no easy matter to 
provide a substitute. Since national prohibition 
went into effect the country has been agitated by 
strikes and other forms of labor unrest. Lowered 
production is everywhere apparent. Here is the 
report of a special grand jury that has been looking 
into the cause of housing shortage in the City of 
Cleveland : 



134 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

"The testimony adduced indicates conclusively 
that it requires approximately twice as long with 
the same number of men to erect a house to-day 
as it did in pre-war times. Impartial tests show 
that it takes twice as many carpenter hours to do 
carpenter work on a building as it did five years 
ago. Bricklayers lay less than half the number of 
bricks; paperhangers, painters, and plasterers all 
do less than half the work in the same time that 
they did five years ago. 

"Manufacturing firms which make and sell 
building materials prove by their records that 
while wages have gone up 200 per cent, in some 
cases, labor costs have gone up 400 per cent., 
indicating that the employees are getting double 
pay for one-half the work as compared with before 
the war." 

These conditions have been duplicated in many of 
the cities throughout the country, and though wages 
have been tending to come to a lower level under the 
pressure of industrial necessity, there has been no 
recognizable readjustment of the work-rate in the 
direction of pre-war efficiency. The very thing which 
has occurred — deterioration — was predicted by the 
leaders of labor. The following is the opinion of 
Mr. Samuel Gompers, President of the American 
Federation of Labor, as to the effect that prohibition 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 135 

would have upon the working man. This effect is 
only the natural sequel of causes which science has 
fully explained. 

"It is not a question of right or wrong. It is 
not a question of whether we approve or dis- 
approve of beer or drinking. It is his habit. And 
when you invade a man's habits, what happens? 
You upset that man. You unsettle him. Uproot- 
ing one habit uproots others. And you find that 
the man who was heretofore satisfied to labor as 
he had been laboring, to go home nights and talk 
or read, becomes restive and discontented. In- 
stead of sitting down to rest and read, he goes out 
into the street. There he meets other men, rest- 
less and unsettled like himself. And in the rubbing 
together of their mutual grievances there are 
sparks and sometimes fire. 

"I have heard it stated, and I believe it, that 
the birth of the Bolsheviki was in prohibition. 
Harmful as vodka was, it enabled the Russian 
peasant to find surcease from the dull monotony 
of his life. Without it he found only trouble and 
torment and the desire to tear down what he could 
not rebuild. And to-day Russia lies bleeding, tor- 
tured. It was too big a price to pay. 

"It is time for all of us to recognize the fact 
that a thing like prohibition cannot be attained by 
executive decree. 



136 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

"It cannot be pounded, with heavy hand, from 
the top downward. It must, like democracy, flow 
from the bottom upward." 

In the prohibition propaganda, much capital has 
been made of the alleged foodstuff waste incfdent to 
the manufacture of alcoholic beverages. Dr. Fisk, 
in his book on alcohol, says : 

"Exact figures are not obtainable, but it is con- 
servatively estimated that probably 110,000,000 
bushels of grain are utilized in the manufacture of 
alcoholic beverages. Grapes and molasses (152,- 
000,000 gallons) must not be forgotten in con- 
sidering these matters. Grapes utilized for sweet 
wines when converted into raisins constitute a 
most valuable preserved food, and this wine-grow- 
ing industry might well be transformed into a 
food-growing industry. 

"It has been estimated that enough grain is 
used in this country in the manufacture of alcoholic 
beverages to supply 11,000,000 loaves of bread 
daily. 

"In addition to the grain used in the manu- 
facture of beer, as at least approximately stated 
in the proclamation of the Brewers' Board of 
Trade (70,505,488 bushels), there should be con- 
sidered the 39,000,000 bushels of corn, rye and 
malt used in distilling spirits, one-half of which 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 137 

was used for industrial purposes in 19 16. Also 
there must be considered the labor of those en- 
gaged in the brewing and distilling business as well 
as in the liquor-selling business. The loss to the 
country involved in depriving real wealth-produc- 
ing industries of the labor of these men and the 
destruction of coal, gasoline, steel, wood and other 
material that is used in the alcohol industries, must 
also be figured in the bill against alcohol — the 
purely economic bill. 

"The plea, therefore, that grave industrial and 
economic injury would result from prohibiting the 
manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages 
naively ignores the real effect of such a measure, 
the diverting into healthful occupations of those 
now engaged in unhealthful occupations that 
involve the destruction of food and the manu- 
facture of a poison instead of the production of 
wealth."* 

No objection whatever is made by the prohibition- 
ists to what they please to term "food waste" and 
"loss to the country involved in depriving real wealth- 
producing industries of labor," etc., when it occurs 
in the process of manufacturing fruit syrups for the 
soda water fountain or unfermented beverages from 
grapes, apples and other fruits. 

* "Alcohol — Its Relation to Human Efficiency and Lon- 
gevity"; pp. 147, 152-4 



138 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Dr. Fisk's grain figures look large by themselves, 
but, like so many of his statements, they lose their 
impressiveness as soon as they are placed in their 
proper perspective. The United States produces 
annually about 5,400,000,000 bushels of grain, so 
that 110,000,000 bushels is only about two per cent, 
of the total. If the grain used in the manufacture 
of alcohol and alcoholic beverages were all loss, the 
cash equivalent would still be less than we pay for the 
activities of the rat. As a purely business proposi- 
tion, extermination of the rat would be a better and 
cheaper undertaking than elimination of the liquor 
industry. 

But even conceding that as the demand for grain 
for home consumption increases, the 110,000,000 
bushels used in the manufacture of alcohol may take 
on a growing importance: what then? In the first 
place, there is a good deal of acreage that the farmer 
does not always use to its full extent. It is better 
for him to plant and sell than deliberately to re- 
strict his output. In the second place, this alcohol 
grain was not entirely lost to other industries. 
Thirty-five per cent, of the grain used in brewing beer 
was returned to the farmer as a dairy food. Soren- 
sen, a Danish authority on the pure food question, 
has recently demonstrated that when barley, which 
is the principal grain used by brewers, is fed to cattle 
only 5 1 per cent, of the food value is utilized. On 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 139 

the other hand, when fed in the form of brewers' 
grain 61 per cent, of the nutritive value is retained. 
In the third place, will prohibition stop the alleged 
waste? To-day our brewers are using the same 
grain in the manufacture of non-alcoholic beers. The 
difference from the economic standpoint is that the 
product has lost much of its food value. 

There is still another side to the question. The 
people are now buying grain and making their own 
beer. Signs like the one below have become familiar 
in the grocers' windows : 

Make Your Own at Home 

Ask Us How 

While home-made beer has the full food value, the 
grain from which it is made goes into the swill pail 
and is lost to the farmer and cattle breeder. Yet the 
argument of grain waste is still being used to pro- 
mote the cause of prohibition. Dr. C. W. Saleeby, 
the British authority on eugenics and an advocate 
(but scarcely authoritative) of temperance, speak- 
ing at the international conference against alcohol- 
ism, expressed the opinion that England must adopt 
prohibition as a grain conservation measure. The 
childish simplicity of some minds is truly remark- 
able. The law of supply and demand cannot be 
long evaded by governmental fiat. The economic 



140 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

question to be considered is not precisely how much 
grain, grapes or molasses is destroyed in the manu- 
facture of alcohol, but whether it is better and 
cheaper for the nation to obtain its alcohol in this 
manner, or through sugars, starches and other 
alcohol-producing foods in the form of candies, 
sweets, etc. A rather interesting comment on Dr. 
Saleeby's statement is provided by the Act of Parlia- 
ment which has just been passed, removing many of 
the war-time restrictions on the sale of manufactured 
alcohol and allowing the brewers and distillers to 
return to the pre-war standard of strength. 

How will prohibition affect our commerce ? Wine 
making is an important industry in many of the 
countries of Europe. Before the Great War the 
United States received large consignments of wines 
from France, Italy and the Rhineland, and whiskies 
and ales from Britain. Our markets for these prod- 
ucts have now been closed to Europe. This is 
particularly unfortunate because of the condition of 
foreign exchange. When the new Greenback party 
came into power in the United States they set an 
example, in their "elastic currency," which started 
the printing presses of the European nations in the 
busy production of paper money as a war measure. 
In June, 19 14, the world's stock of gold coin and 
bullion far exceeded the amount of paper money in 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 141 

circulation. The ratio of gold to paper at that time 
was estimated at $141 gold to every $100 paper. 
According to the latest figures, although the gold 
supply has increased, the ratio to-day (excluding the 
Bolshevik government) is only $19 gold for every 
$100 paper. Statistics issued by the British Govern- 
ment in November, 19 19, showed that the expansion 
of currency, taking 19 13 as par (100) was: 

In the United States (up to May, 19 10) 173 

In Great Britain (August, 19 19) 244 

In France (June, 1919) 365 

In Italy (April, 19 19) 440 

Substantial additions to the paper currencies of 
the Allied Nations have accrued since these statistics 
were compiled. 

Great issues of paper money have been made in 
Germany. The Bank of Germany lost 1,458,508,- 
000 marks gold during the year following the arm- 
istice, but added 13,669,154,000 marks to its note 
circulation. The gold cover on November 15, 191 8, 
was 14 per cent, and a year later it had shrunk to 
3 . 1 per cent. This currency inflation has of course 
been reflected in the rates for foreign exchange, as 
will be seen by reference to the following table. 
Serious depreciation has occurred even in the case of 
Great Britain, although she is producing large quan- 
tities of gold in her colonial possessions. 



142 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Parity Oct. 1920 Aug. 1921 
Great Britain Sterling $4.8665 $3,435 $3.65 
France Franc • I 93° -0645 .0772 

Italy Lira . 1930 -0374 .0432 

Germany Mark .2380 .0141 ,0119 

It is perfectly obvious that foreign paper is no 
longer effective as a medium for negotiating a pur- 
chase in other countries. What is the solution? 
These nations must return to the ancient system of 
barter, or, what is but one step removed, must 
establish credits by the shipment of goods. 

A substantial part of the export trade of Europe 
consists in the shipment of fine wines, brandies and 
other alcoholic liquors. These commodities must 
now find another market, for no one is foolish enough 
to suppose that France, Italy and the Rhineland will 
abandon their wine-growing industries to please 
American financiers who preach prohibition in their 
churches while their business associates invest their 
money in corn products, sugars and other alcohol- 
producing foods, which will become increasingly 
necessary with the enforcement of the Eighteenth 
Amendment. The credits set up by the wine-grow- 
ing countries will be lost to America, and will be used 
to make purchases in other countries; cotton from 
Egypt, grain and beef from The Argentine, etc. 
In turning away this business we are deliberately 
encouraging trade with our competitors. Every de- 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 143 

partment-store owner is familiar with the advantages 
to be gained by offering attractive bargains to bring 
customers into the shop. The loss of our wine- 
growing customers, and the trade which these exports 
to other countries will encourage, will undoubtedly 
lead to great commercial changes — how great we 
cannot now foresee. 

The following schedule should be found interest- 
ing for reference. 

Importations from Europe of alcoholic bever- 
ages for the year 19 13 (the last year before 
the trade was interrupted by the war). 

England 

Malt liquors and other beverages 

in bottles or jugs 872,964 gals. 

in other coverings 575,245 
Brandy 4*699 pf. gals. 

Cordials 16,764 " " 

Whisky 57,143 " " 

Gin 703,070 " " 
All other spirits distilled 33*836 " " 

Champagnes and other sparkling 

wines I 5>7 2 9 doz. qts. 

Still wines in casks 32,352 gals. 

Still wines in other coverings 5,586 doz. qts. 

Scotland 

Malt liquors and other beverages 

in bottles or jugs 11*273 gals, 

in other coverings 5*969 " 



144 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 



Brandy 


326 pf. gals. 


Cordials 


939 " " 


Whisky 


895,026 " " 


Gin 


4,950 " " 


All other spirits distilled 


6,034 " " 


Champagnes and other sparkling 




wines 


2,915 doz. qts. 


Still wines in casks 


2,581 gals. 


Still wines in other coverings 


725 doz. qts. 


Ireland 




Malt liquors and other beverages 




in bottles or jugs 


461,422 gals. 


in other coverings 


676,650 


Brandy 


610 pf. gals. 


Cordials 


23 " « 


Whisky 


162,17s " " 


Gin 


3.135 " " 


All other spirits distilled 


342 " " 


Champagnes and other sparkling 




wines 




Still wines in casks 


35 gals. 


Still wines in other coverings 


204 doz. qts. 


France 




Malt liquors and other beverages 




in bottles or jugs 


71 gals. 


in other coverings 




Brandy 


487>445 P^ gals. 


Cordials 


190,027 " 


Whisky 


739 " 


Gin 


544 " " 


All other spirits distilled 


5,656 " " 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 145 

Champagnes and other sparkling 

wines 246,361 doz. qts. 

Still wines in casks 232,152 gals. 

Still wines in other coverings 227,273 doz. qts. 

Italy 

Malt liquors and other beverages 

in bottles or jugs 

in other coverings 

Brandy 10,980 pf. gals. 

Cordials 168,569 " " 

Whisky 245 " " 

Gin 4 " " 

All other spirits distilled 9,005 " " 
Champagnes and other sparkling 

wines 1,575 d° z - q ts « 
Still wines in casks 1,912,500 gals. 

Still wines in other coverings 236,134 doz. qts. 

All Other European Countries 
Malt liquors and other beverages 

in bottles or jugs 95, J 93 gals* 

in other coverings 4,978,397 



Brandy 




97,604 


pf. gals. 


Cordials 




174,368 


u 


u 


Whisky 




6,337 


u 


ii 


Gin 




139.352 


(( 


u 


All other spirits distilled • 


117,011 


u 


u 


Champagnes 


and other sparkling 








wines 




14,120 


doz. 


qts. 


Still wines ir 


1 casks 1 


,713*619 


gal 


s. 


Still wines in 


other coverings 


173.295 


doz. 


qts. 



There is probably no more important influence on 
national thrift than the methods employed by the 



146 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

government in raising the necessary funds to meet 
the national expenses. The question of what is the 
best form of taxation has been agitated by all politi- 
cal parties. Prohibition has deprived the treasury 
of over $1,000,000,000 in taxes,* and this loss must 
be made up from some other source, — a very serious 
problem, coming as it does at a time when the coun- 
try is overburdened with taxation. The Dry party 
has attempted to belittle the issue by statements that 
the loss will be made up by the saving which the new 
order of things will promote and that the excise tax 
is an immoral tax, based on drunkenness and vice. 
This is sheer nonsense. There is probably no better 
form of taxation than the liquor tax. Compared 
with our present income and inheritance taxes, it is 
highly moral. The excise tax sat lightly on the 
people. For those who used alcohol in moderation, 
it was negligible. It was an appreciable tax only 
on luxury and waste and acted as a restraint to self- 
indulgence, except in the case of those improvident 
people who like to indulge in luxury for its own sake. 
On the other hand, the income and inheritance taxes, 
in their graduated form, impose a burden on the 
industrious and thrifty for the benefit of the shiftless 
and improvident. In addition to all this, there is 

*The figures given by Professor E. R. A. Seligman of 
Columbia University when testifying before the Senate 
Finance Committee. 



THE ECONOMIC SIDE 147 

the very considerable cost to the taxpayer of enforc- 
ing the amendment, for the necessary moneys for 
administering the Volstead Act and state laws like 
the Mullan-Gage Act certainly cannot be obtained 
from fines and penalties unless our revenue agents 
are prepared to encourage law-breaking. 

In computing the expense of prohibition, we must 
add the increase in our food bill, for in limiting the 
sources from which alcohol can be obtained (and 
unquestionably the malting of grain is cheaper than 
any other method of producing it), the price of a 
necessary commodity has been raised, whether it is 
produced naturally in the system or is obtained by 
manufacture. 

Eventually we shall be able to make an approxi- 
mate estimate of the monetary cost of prohibition, 
but no one will ever be able to calculate the price we 
shall have to pay through the impairment it will 
cause in the morale of the nation. Hobson, the 
professional prohibitionist, has estimated that at the 
time the Eighteenth Amendment went into effect 
there were one million heavy drinkers in the United 
States — less than one per cent, of the population. 
To-day there are many millions of law-breakers, for 
the people have resented the intrusion upon their 
personal liberties and are not obeying the law. 
America has grown great because of the freedom 
which was guaranteed to her people under the Bill of 



148 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Rights given to us by the Fathers, This freedom has 
attracted some of the best blood of the old world, 
and the nation developed it under the Constitution. 
The men who were able to conquer a wilderness were 
able to conquer self. But the national character 
has now fallen so low that it must be taken in hand 
by a paternalistic government. It is a strange turn 
of the wheel of fortune that to-day, when the example 
which we set has borne fruit and democracy has 
spread throughout the world, the freedom which we 
once enjoyed should be distorted and strangled by 
bureaucratic regulation. 



CHAPTER XIX 

THE IAW AND PERSONAL LIBERTY 

The legality of the Eighteenth Amendment has 
been upheld by the Supreme Court. A majority of 
the states, through their legislatures, have decided 
that prohibition is for the best interests of the coun- 
try, and according to the court's decision they had 
the right so to amend the Constitution. The court 
has ruled that every technical safeguard that the 
Fathers provided has been fully complied with. The 
decision is of momentous importance to the people 
of America because of the questions of the rights of 
property, state rights and personal liberty involved. 

There is a condition which no form of popular 

government has been able to guard against — the 

ignorance or apathy of the people themselves. In 

this case ignorance was organized — organized by 

selfish, sordid interests which hoped to profit by the 

new order of things. There is but one way in which 

this condition can be met by a law-abiding people; 

that is, by education and repeal. In the case of 

prohibition this is all the more difficult because the 

movement has been clothed in a false mantle of 

righteousness, by which the real situation has been 

149 



150 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

concealed. The weakness of the whole proceeding 
from the legal standpoint is shown by the fact that 
its promoters deemed it necessary to amend the Con- 
stitution, to nail the flag of prohibition to the mast- 
head as it were, beyond the reach of recall. If the 
measure had been wise, this would have been un- 
necessary. A law must pass the test of wisdom to 
survive. No form of enactment can prevent a 
vicious law from becoming a dead letter. 

Law is the accumulated experience of humanity 
codified for use in the regulation of human relations. 
All law has its foundation in the laws of nature. By 
his inability to govern wisely, man has shown only 
too often that his interpretation of nature and na- 
ture's requirements was at fault. In every age, 
from the dawn of history to the present day, there 
have been periods when he has been led astray and 
has forgotten that there are limits to his lawmaking 
which nature has imposed and beyond which he can- 
not go. Whatever contradicts the fundamental 
naturally cannot prosper. 

It is becoming more and more of a practice in 
legislation to place the interest of the community 
above the rights of the individual. We must not 
forget that the community is made up of individuals 
and that any injury to the latter may react upon the 
former. Prohibition is a serious invasion of the 
property rights of the individual. One of the pre- 



LAW AND PERSONAL LIBERTY 151 

dominant human instincts is our desire to own and 
enjoy what we have acquired as the result of our 
own labor. We have this instinct in common with 
the lower animals. It is the right of ownership with 
all that goes with it which induces the squirrel to 
gather nuts for his winter store. Nature prescribes 
individual ownership of what is necessary for individ- 
ual development. This is the rock on which all 
socialistic schemes have split, from More's Utopia to 
Bolshevism. For large numbers of men, unless a 
spirit of almost inhuman self-sacrifice becomes more 
prevalent than we have any reason to expect, will 
never work for a state or community of all sorts 
and conditions, including the shiftless and lazy, as 
they will work for their own interests. 

The right of possession, the right to own property, 
is fundamental in the laws of civilized nations. Land 
is the most enduring form of property. The titles 
to real estate are jealously guarded by law. Land is 
valuable primarily for what it will produce. The 
right of ownership carries with it the right to dispose 
of the products of the soil, including alcohol. That 
there are some people who make an improper use of 
alcohol is not a sufficient reason for preventing the 
landowner from selling his product, thus depriving 
him of a part of the value of his land. To prohibit 
the sale of alcohol, for the sake of those who abuse it, 
is no more just or right than it would be to prevent 



152 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

the farmer from selling his wheat because there are 
some who injure themselves by overeating. There is 
an old saying that man digs his grave with his teeth. 
It has been computed that for every man who drinks 
himself to death there are eleven who die from over- 
eating. But we have no constitutional amendment — 
unenforceable, of course — to prohibit the sale of 
meat or bread. The absurdity would be too self- 
evident even for the shallowest type of propagandist. 
Yet they cannot see the absurdity of prohibiting the 
sale of alcohol, which nature has made essential for 
the well-being of the human system. The fact that 
a medical labor union has denied this elementary 
scientific fact — and then proceeded to profit finan- 
cially to an enormous extent by denying its denial (in 
practice) and prescribing alcohol for medicinal pur- 
poses — does not prove that nature has made a mis- 
take and should be duly corrected. It simply proves 
that the medical authorities made no mistake in 
seeing that a monopoly in a vital commodity would 
be extremely lucrative. 

A practical test of the wisdom of any enactment 
is to try to put it in operation. As a secondary 
though not always reliable test, we may inquire as to 
the knowledge and probity of the legislators who 
passed upon the law. It is little to the credit of 
those responsible for the adoption of the Eighteenth 
Amendment that they ignored the failure of prohibi- 



LAW AND PERSONAL LIBERTY 153 

tion when put to a practical test in other countries 
and in sections of the United States; nor does it 
speak well for their intelligence that they were will- 
ing to disregard a fundamental principle in our 
government, that in matters of intimate concern to 
the individual and the home the states are better 
fitted than the federal authorities to decide upon 
suitable action. 

When the Constitution was adopted and the 
United States became a nation, the Founders rec- 
ognized the principle of states' rights. Even at 
that time the difference in climatic and other condi- 
tions made it plain that there were certain matters 
which could only be regulated properly by the states 
themselves. The f arseeing wisdom of those builders 
for future generations has become increasingly evi- 
dent with the expansion of our territories. What 
was but a fringe of states along the Atlantic seaboard 
has become a great nation, extending from the At- 
lantic to the Pacific, from Alaska to Florida and the 
tropical Philippines. The fact that this expansion 
occurred during the railway age prevented the far 
greater differences of opinions and customs that 
would have been inevitable at an earlier period in 
the world's history. But the differences that exist 
cannot be ignored by statesmen or economists, and 
prohibition should certainly have been left for regu- 
lation to the states, which understood and could pro- 



154 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

vide for local conditions and opinion. It is typical 
of the ignorance which surrounded the subject that 
the legislators of the granger states of the West 
should have presumed to pass on an enactment regu- 
lating the habits of the manufacturing and commer- 
cial population of the East; that the farmers of 
Kansas should attempt to tell the workers in the 
brass factories of Connecticut or the sailors of 
Rhode Island and Massachusetts what they must or 
must not eat and drink. We might as well expect 
the State of Florida to dictate to the citizens of 
Alaska what they must wear and at what hour they 
must go to bed. Nature is the only authority whose 
dictation fits the conditions. 

The extent of the prohibition propaganda is even 
now perhaps not fully realized. It was limited only 
by the size of the fund which the interests behind 
the Anti-Saloon League were willing to supply. We 
can get some idea of the amount of money spent an- 
nually for prohibition purposes from the budget 
which the Anti-Saloon League gave out early in 1920, 
after prohibition had become an accomplished fact. 
This budget carried the stupendous total of $27,- 
920,300. There is a good deal of persuasive force 
in practically twenty-eight millions of dollars. 

The people's representatives, like the people them- 
selves to a certain extent, were deliberately cor- 
rupted — not with cash, but with sophisms. For 



LAW AND PERSONAL LIBERTY 155 

years false information on alcohol has been pounded 
into the public, and our legislators have absorbed it. 
They may have the best intentions without having 
infallible intelligence. Corruption is corruption 
whether it is of morals or of mind. It was cor- 
ruption in Shakespeare's time. It was thus that Iago 
was able to warp the mind of Othello. It is cor- 
ruption to-day. Are we going to permit laws passed 
by such methods to stand upon the statute books? 
There is no such thing as personal liberty if we must 
be constantly on our guard against this kind of legis- 
lation. 

Let us look a little more closely into the 
methods by which these modern Iagos were able to 
sway popular opinion and influence our legislators. 
We can pass over the appeals which were made to 
the lowest side of their natures, for although stories 
of intimidation and coercion are current, in a na- 
tional movement such as this these would have but 
a limited influence. That bribery may have been 
used we will not question. We are only too familiar 
with the temptations that beset our public officials, 
and we have become accustomed to almost daily dis- 
closures of graft in government departments. 
Where there are so many professional politicians we 
must expect some corruption of a gross kind. Law- 
makers are not the only lawbreakers: every class 
has its objectionable elements. But those who could 



i 5 6 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

be reached by admittedly fraudulent methods were in 
the minority. A large majority of the men who 
voted for prohibition were either convinced that it 
would be for the good of the country or were willing 
to give it the benefit of the doubt and let it have a 
trial. If it proved a failure, that would be the surest 
way to end the agitation among their constituents at 
home. 

In bringing legislators to this point of view, the 
stand which medical authorities had taken against 
alcohol was the deciding factor. When they wrote 
the word "Poison'' across the label of the whisky 
bottle, it accomplished far more for prohibition than 
all the other propaganda put together. No more 
convincing argument could have been used, especially 
among those fathers and mothers whose children 
were just approaching manhood or womanhood. 
The father was besought to save his boys from the 
temptations that he as a young man had been sub- 
jected to. It possibly never occurred to him that it 
would be better to teach children how to use alcohol 
properly, just as they are taught to ride and swim, or 
to drive an automobile. Would it not have been 
better for the indulgent mother to teach her children 
self-restraint rather than turn their moral and phys- 
ical welfare over to the United States Government, 
as if they were foundlings of the nation? Will our 
women, now that they have received the respon- 



LAW AND PERSONAL LIBERTY 157 

sibility of the suffrage, attempt to evade their natural 
duty of caring for their own offspring? What will 
be the effect upon the characters of future gener- 
ations if this policy of parental suicide is continued? 

It was among the women of the country that the 
medical propaganda was most effective. The 
mother in caring for her children through their early 
illnesses has come to rely on the family physician, 
and the trust which he has personally inspired has 
taught her a respect for official medical opinion. 
The practising physician stands between the people 
and the medical politicians. His word goes unques- 
tioned because of general ignorance of the fact that 
his medical efficiency is limited by a strict control 
exercised by the leaders of his union. To use an 
expression of one of the shining lights of the pro- 
fession, the practising physician is only the plumber 
who uses the lead pipe which is given him. The 
practitioner is exploited by the leaders of organized 
medicine just as the ironworkers, the carpenters and 
masons are exploited by the Sam Parks and Bob 
Brindells of the building trade. The disastrous 
results to medical practice are every day more ap- 
parent. 

You can scarcely have forgotten the great influenza 
epidemic, when the people died by thousands and the 
dead lay unburied in the receiving vaults and under- 
taking establishments throughout the country. Long 



158 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

before the outbreak of the pandemic science had 
mastered the disease, but the knowledge was sup- 
pressed by the medical ring for selfish reasons. Do 
you think these men would hesitate at such a little 
thing as conveying false information on alcohol to 
our legislatures if it served their own ends ? When 
we realize the toll which disease is exacting from old 
and young alike, when we think of a life like Theo- 
dore Roosevelt's sacrificed to medical ignorance or 
indifference, it is only too apparent that new methods 
are badly needed, and that the revolt against the 
medical organization, which the prohibition contro- 
versy has so largely developed, must not end until 
present evils have been rooted out and the health of 
the nation has been placed in safer hands. 



CHAPTER XX 

THE LABOR UNION 

In a country as large as the United States there 
are naturally many and varied interests, continually 
increasing with the development of the nation. What 
was once chiefly an agricultural community is now 
divided into urban, suburban and farming districts, 
railway and mining centres, mill towns, etc., with 
different problems to meet and different ways of 
looking at daily life. Each interest has grown in 
importance, and this has been reflected in legislation. 
Our industrial life has also been split up into its 
classes, — capital and labor, the employer and the 
employed, the producer and the consumer. Too 
often these classes have clashed, and they have lost 
sight of the fact that the welfare of the country as a 
whole depends upon the cooperation of all sections 
and groups. 

No interest has grown in recent years as has 
the labor union, which is largely a development of a 
democratic form of government. The professional 
politician has turned from the organization of politi- 
cal bodies to the more profitable occupation of organ- 
izing labor. Some undesirable features have fol- 

159 



160 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

lowed, and the legitimate purposes of cooperative 
effort have not always been adhered to. Labor 
unionism, so far as it really helps the worker, is of 
course a good thing. If it interferes with the rights 
of others, as so often happens, it must be condemned. 
Where it runs counter to clear economic laws it 
becomes impossible, and the sooner this phase of the 
situation is cleared up the better for all concerned. 

A brief review of certain aspects of trade unionism 
will bring out their bearing on the prohibition ques- 
tion. 

The introduction of machinery, with its many 
labor-saving devices, has brought new problems into 
our industrial life. The greater output which can 
now be obtained has increased the value, or let us 
say the power, of capital. This in turn has put a 
premium on thrift and has added to the hardships 
of the lazy and improvident. For capital is nothing 
more than wages or some other form of income 
which the receiver has been able to save and then 
apply to lighten the task of the worker. The pres- 
ent vast accumulations of capital are both the result 
and the cause of efficiency. 

We have only to look back to the early days of the 
American Colonies to realize the striking changes 
which have occurred through the development of our 
national industries. At the time when the Virginia 
and Plymouth Colonies had become firmly estab- 



THE LABOR UNION 161 

lished, a majority of the colonists were landowners 
and were able to support themselves, if need were, 
upon the products of their own land. The early 
settler was able to build his own house, raise his own 
food, and supply his own fuel and part of his cloth- 
ing. His children, when old enough, furnished him 
with additional labor. He asked little from his 
neighbor except companionship and mutual protec- 
tion against their common enemies. 

With the growth of the colonies, trades and pro- 
fessions sprang up. The man who devotes himself 
to any one occupation, as the cobbler or carpenter, 
can do a better job and in a shorter time than the 
man who occasionally turns his hand to that par- 
ticular trade. The specialists invested their earnings 
in better tools (their capital) or in labor-saving 
devices, as in the case of the miller who built his own 
mill. Thus it became advantageous for the land- 
owner to employ these expert workmen, who could 
do better and yet cheaper work than he could do for 
himself. (What would the colonists have thought if 
a Plumb had arisen among them with a plan to turn 
the mill which the miller had built with his own hands 
over to his employees?) But it was not always 
profitable for the employer to have work done for 
him, because there were idle moments in his own day 
which would have been lost if he could not employ 
them in doing some of the things usually assigned to 



1 62 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

others. No workman, however expert, can compete 
against the idle time of his employer. It may sur- 
prise some of the dwellers in our cities to hear that 
many farmers to-day, in addition to raising and 
marketing their money crop, produce most of their 
own food, even raising and grinding their own flour 
and meal and curing their own meats, and also doing 
their own mason and carpenter work and various 
other things to fill in the spare time. 

The development of labor-saving devices is every 
day making it more difficult for the individual to 
compete with the machine, because his own time is 
becoming more valuable. Take as an example the 
service which is rendered by the railroads. Compute 
the expense of a trip from New York to Boston on 
foot or on horseback — the time lost, the hotel bills 
incurred — and compare this with the cost of the 
railroad ticket. Such time-saving devices have added 
to the importance and power of the labor operating 
them. But no industrial union has ever attempted 
to prevent the individual doing his own work himself. 
He may be denied the assistance of organized labor, 
but that is as far as they have ventured to go. If a 
man wishes to walk to Boston he is still at liberty to 
do so. It is vastly important to the development 
of our national life that the individual should be free 
to act for himself, not merely for the encouragement 
of initiative and invention, and so on, but because 



THE LABOR UNION 163 

the standard of organized effort is thus raised or at 
least maintained. Without the bracing effect of in- 
dividualism, combinations would often deteriorate as 
the result of the very advantages they can command. 

It has remained for the medical union to violate 
this principle. They have not only endeavored to 
control the practice of medicine, but have also tried 
through legislation to force their services upon the 
individual by placing curative agents beyond his 
reach, as has been done in the case of alcohol. As 
some perhaps may question the propriety of putting 
associations which have always posed as scientific in 
the same category as the organizations of ordinary 
labor, it should be remembered that they themselves 
have sought this classification. In the Bremer 
County case, which was carried up to the Supreme 
Court of Iowa, the medical organization successfully 
defended itself by pleading the right of "labor" to 
organize. And further, their strikes, boycotts and 
other labor union methods have been fully exposed 
in courts of this country and Great Britain. 

The industrial unions have followed blindly the 
lure of higher wages held out to them by their 
leaders. They did not see that by standardizing 
labor and thus putting a premium on poor workman- 
ship and a lowered output, they were increasing the 
cost of necessities to themselves as well as to the rest 
of the country. They have only recently begun to 



1 64 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

realize that wages can be forced so high that they 
cannot afford to accept them. The laboring man 
is not an economist; he cannot be blamed for his 
short-sightedness. But it is one thing (and quite 
serious enough) for the labor unions to attempt to 
interfere with the law of supply and demand, and 
regulate the market for labor. It is another thing, 
and altogether too serious, for a medical union, in 
its frenzied efforts to control the profession, to bar 
the advance of science in the effective treatment of 
disease. Even the most thoughtless or ignorant can 
understand the harm resulting from this phase of 
labor unionism. And the laboring man has been the 
greatest sufferer. 

Let me ask you, Master Carpenter: Do yon 
think of the bonnie golden-haired daughter who used 
to meet you at the gate of an evening to take your 
dinner pail when you returned from your work? Of 
course you do. She has seldom been out of your 
thoughts since the day when you took her little body 
to the cemetery. It was a labor union that deprived 
you, deprived your physician, of what might have 
saved her life. — And you, Mr. Coal Miner. You 
have given the country a good deal of trouble in 
recent years. Do you think of that young wife so 
soon to become a mother who was carried off in the 
great influenza pandemic ? Do you know that it was 
medical ignorance that was responsible for the high 



THE LABOR UNION 165 

death rate among pregnant women, and that a labor 
union kept the knowledge of proper treatment from 
the physicians of the country? — And you, wives of 
the trainmen whose leaders held a pistol to the head 
of Congress to force the Adamson Law upon the 
country. You were rather proud of that achieve- 
ment, were you not? Many of your sons died in 
the epidemics of the army camps. Your loss would 
have been easier to bear if your boys had had the 
glory of a soldier's death upon the field of battle. 
But to be stricken down like rats in a camp epidemic 
was hard, very hard. Do you know that it was a 
labor union in control of the medical departments of 
the government that stood in the path of science, and 
so was able to continue improper treatments that 
have been failing in these diseases for two thousand 
years or more? When you talk with your Plumbs 
about unionizing our transportation system, look 
first and see what the union has done for our medical 
departments. 

When the opponents of national prohibition under- 
took a careful inquiry into the various forces behind 
the movement, the medical departments at Washing- 
ton were one of the first subjects of investigation. 
What followed was almost beyond belief. They 
found men, American citizens, wearing the uniform 
of the United States Army in war time, obeying the 
rules of their union but defying the laws and the Con- 



1 66 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

stitution of the United States. These men were 
permitting disease to go unchecked rather than inter- 
fere with the interests of a private organization of 
which they were members. Is it any wonder that 
the country has been flooded with false information 
on alcohol when the people must rely for their med- 
ical knowledge on public servants such as these ? 



CHAPTER XXI 

ENFORCEMENT 

Can national prohibition be really enforced? 

A fundamental error in dealing with the liquor 
problem is the conception of alcohol as a habit-form- 
ing drug. The prohibitionist has all along held to 
the theory that once alcohol was abolished, the re- 
generation of the drunkard would follow automat- 
ically. If this were true, the enforcement of the 
Eighteenth Amendment would be a simple matter 
compared with the problem with which the country 
is now faced. But if we accept the more enlightened 
view that alcohol is a necessary food, enforcement 
becomes all but impossible. No one will stand for 
compulsory starvation. The hunger striker piay 
accept self-imposed starvation for the sake of a 
principle, but no one, if he can help himself, will 
permit starvation to be forced upon him by others. 
Therefore, to enforce prohibition the necessity for 
alcohol must be done away with. 

We shall have a better understanding of the en- 
forcement problem if we go straight to the question 
of the reformation of the drunkard. Most people 

are more or less familiar with the methods employed 

167 



1 68 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

in the institutions for the reform of inebriates. When 
the chronic drunkard takes refuge in one of these 
asylums, he is first weaned from the alcoholic drink. 
Sugars are substituted, and his system is accustomed 
to making its own alcohol. His body is built up by 
wholesome food, rational recreation, fresh air and 
exercise. Then the attempt is made to create within 
the patient an aversion to alcohol. In some of these 
cases the cure is permanent, in others the drunkard 
returns to his old habits. Where the institutions 
have failed is in losing sight of the fact that to cure 
alcoholism permanently, the need for alcohol must 
be eliminated. 

In many instances, alcoholism is brought about 
through other habits of the individual. The old 
drink habit is compelling, but where we have a com- 
bination of this with a crying need of the body, we 
have a force which it is almost impossible to control. 
Take, for example, the son of wealthy parents with 
no special interest in life except his own amusement. 
His existence becomes monotonous, and it has al- 
ready been shown that monotony, by its effect on the 
nervous system, contributes to the need for alcohol. 
When such a man has fallen into the drink habit and 
has then "taken the cure," the chances are that, 
unless he finds some new interest in life, he will 
return to his old indulgences. If not, the nerves 
may become affected and the system laid open to 



ENFORCEMENT 169 

attack by disease. Dr. Fisk tells us, u In the expe- 
rience of the forty-three (life insurance) companies, 
among those who had taken a cure, but remained 
total abstainers up to the time of acceptance, the 
mortality was 35 per cent, above the normal."* 
When we have a better understanding of the liquor 
question, the reformation of the drunkard will be 
easier. But the present problem of reforming the 
whole United States along the lines laid down by the 
prohibitionist is one which staggers the imagination. 
We must either choose between alcohol or disease, 
or readjust the lives of all our people. The brass 
worker must leave the foundry for some less nerve- 
racking employment. The sailor must give up his 
voyages. Disease, worry, fear, must all be elimin- 
ated, and then, perhaps, prohibition can be enforced. 
Instead of prohibition bringing on the millennium, we 
must first have the millennium before we can expect 
prohibition. 

The situation as it stands to-day is that a necessary 
commodity, a food which the people must have, has 
been taken away from them and put in the hands of 
agents of the government to be doled out as they see 
fit. The natural result has been that the price of 
alcohol has risen to an abnormal figure. When a 
condition like this arises we shall always find people 

* "Alcohol — Its Relation to Human Efficiency and Lon- 
gevity" ; p. 25. 



170 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

who are willing to risk the penalties of the law in 
order to reap a golden harvest only too easily 
obtained. But in the present case there is the fur- 
ther element that as so many of our citizens look 
upon prohibition as an encroachment upon their per- 
sonal liberties, the lawbreaker is finding encourage- 
ment from all classes of society. Men of the highest 
character and attainment, statesmen, bankers, law- 
yers, authors, artists, business men and day laborers, 
all alike, are not only countenancing these law- 
breakers, but they are violating the law themselves. 
They deny the right and the power of the govern- 
ment to supervise their personal habits and manner 
of life. There were many who thought, because 
they had given up alcohol at one time or another and 
had felt the better for it, that they would welcome 
prohibition. They did not realize the difference be- 
tween abstinence by mental resolve and an absti- 
nence forced upon them. Nor did they know that in 
many instances their fall from the water wagon was 
due to a need of the body which they did not know 
how to control. And so there are many good people 
who, while believing in prohibition theoretically, 
are now drinking more than is good for them out 
of protest. As Mr. Irvin S. Cobb has said so 
characteristically and exactly, prohibition simply 
prohibits sobriety among people who would other- 
wise be sober. 



ENFORCEMENT 171 

The enforcement law has brought with it a law- 
lessness on the part of the people never before known 
in the annals of the nation.* Violations of the 
Volstead Act have been followed by a wave of crime 
which can be traced directly to prohibition. The 
crimes committed vary in seriousness from infrac- 
tions of the rules of the road by speeding auto- 
mobiles of the rum runners, to the most callous 
murder. Between these two extremes are all sorts 
and kinds of criminal offences, — forgery, counter- 
feiting, smuggling, blackmail, extortion, illicit dis- 
tillation, burglary and highway robbery, the sale of 
deadly concoctions, and the debauching of public 
officials. The details have appeared repeatedly in 
the newspapers and magazines. The reader may 
therefore be spared any repetition. The corruption 
of government agents is indeed a serious phase of the 
situation, for it has added to the power of the corrupt 
politician. The practical politician is familiar with 
the numerous opportunities for illicit profits which 
are always connected with measures for the regula- 
tion of public conduct. The health boards and the 
building departments of many of our cities have 

* William H. Moran, Chief of the Secret Service Bureau 
at Washington, testifying before the Appropriations Com- 
mittee of the House of Representatives, stated that the year 
1920 (the first year of constitutional prohibition) was the 
greatest criminal year in the history of the secret service. 



172 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

been hotbeds of graft, but as a breeder of nation- 
wide corruption no previous legislation has ever 
equalled the Volstead Act. It would be interesting to 
know how many votes were gained for the Eight- 
eenth Amendment by the prospects of the rich 
graft to be obtained in its enforcement. If there is 
anyone who doubts this, let him look at some of the 
characters appointed to carry out the provisions of 
the law — men so low that it has been an easy matter 
for the crook and impostor to impersonate them. 
Take the case of the enforcement agent who killed 
a chauffeur during a "wet" raid in New York City. 
His record is one of a long series of crimes. His 
early offences include petty larceny and the passing 
of worthless checks. He served four years and 
•seven months of an eight-year sentence in the In- 
diana State Penitentiary. He then broke his parole 
and came East. He was convicted of robbery and 
sent to Sing Sing prison, where he served a six- 
year term. His last offence was killing the chauffeur, 
for which he was tried for murder in the first de- 
gree, and acquitted, through the able defence of a 
United States District Attorney. Even after his 
record was known, he was carried on the payroll of 
the United States. While this may be an extreme 
case, it shows the type of men to whom the govern- 
ment intrusted the mission of improving our morals, 



ENFORCEMENT 173 

for prohibition is still being bolstered up by this plea. 
We are now beginning to understand the reason 
why so many of the states that have gone dry, stay 
dry. The Eighteenth Amendment has created a new 
brand of prohibitionist, the ex-saloon keeper and the 
cheap politician, with their long retinue of heelers 
who are realizing enormous profits through the 
illegal sale of alcoholic liquors at fancy prices. If 
an attempt were made to repeal the amendment, 
these men would be found lined up in its defence 
with the forces of the Anti-Saloon League. All this 
has added to the public resentment, which has been 
growing steadily since the passage of the enforce- 
ment legislation. The people of the states where 
the largest part of our population is located have not 
favored prohibition. This is true of nearly all the 
original thirteen states. Back in the 'fifties, thirteen 
northern states adopted prohibition, but they soon 
abandoned it, with the exception of Maine, where 
with the aid of the bootleggers the prohibitionists 
were able to retain the statute. An analysis of the 
vote on national prohibition shows that in states 
with a total population of over 63,000,000 people 
there either has been no recent expression of popular 
opinion, or the people have voted against it. In 
some instances, legislators chosen at the same election 
in which the people of the state voted against prohi- 
bition, reversed the popular decision and voted for 



174 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

the Eighteenth Amendment. There is much the 
same feeling against prohibition in these states as 
there was in our forefathers' time against the Stamp 
Act, — with this difference, that the Stamp Act was 
imposed by a government in which our people had no 
voice, while prohibition was adopted by the very men 
whom the people elected, and they feel that these 
men have betrayed them. 

To the resentment of the wets has been added a 
growing resentment on the part of the drys. Many 
a prohibitionist believed that prohibition would 
stamp out drunkenness. He is now beginning to 
realize that in its practical application, at any rate, 
prohibition is a failure. Light wines and beers have 
been almost done away with. Whisky, gin and other 
beverages of high alcoholic content have taken their 
place. Whereas before prohibition these high proof 
liquors were bought largely by the drink, they are 
now purchased by the quart, the gallon or the case. 
Quite often, when once a bottle is opened, it is not 
put away until it has been emptied. 

The records of our police courts and hospitals are 
the best evidence of the futility of the Eighteenth 
Amendment as a temperance measure. When na- 
tional prohibition first went into effect, there was a 
temporary falling off in the number of recorded 
cases of drunkenness, because the regular channels 
by which alcoholic liquors had been obtained ran dry. 



ENFORCEMENT 175 

It was not long, however, before new sources of 
supply were found. As the people began to adjust 
themselves to the change, the fact was recorded 
in an increasing number of cases of alcoholism. The 
conditions in New York City, the largest city in the 
Union, are typical of those in all parts of the country 
where prohibition has found no popular support. 

The following is the record of the arraignments 
in the city magistrates' courts for the first seven 
months of constitutional prohibition : 

Month Borough of Manhattan New York City 

January 39 67 

February 65 152 

March 181 342 



April 


214 


423 


May 


249 


501 


June 


244 


471 


July 


227 


495 



For the quarter ending December 31, 19 19, the 
total number of arraignments was 936. During the 
quarter ending June 30, 1920, 1395 cases were 
arraigned. 

The hospital figures tell the same story. Here is 
the record of the cases of alcoholism admitted to the 
wards of Bellevue Hospital, Manhattan, and Kings 
County Hospital, Brooklyn, for the first nine months 
of the years 1919 and 1920 :* 

* War-time prohibition went into effect on July 1, 191 9; 
constitutional prohibition on January 16, 1920. 



176 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Bellevue Hospital 



Month 






1919 


1920 


January 






244 


103 


February 






209 


49 


March 






226 


94 


April 






228 


99 


May 






272 


no 


June 






209 


113 


July 






182 


125 


August 






124 


166 


September 






116 


155 




Kings County Hospital 




Month 






1919 


1920 


January 






114 


27 


February 






88 


n 


March 






76 


25 


£f ril 






82 


47 


May 






77 


53 


June 






63 


53 


July 






50 


59 


August i to Aug. 


19 


33 


32 


August 19 


to Sep. 


21 


40 


93 



Here is a summary of a report by a special inves- 
tigator for Leslie's Weekly, after a careful survey of 
conditions throughout the country: 

"It is estimated that two in every five homes of 
the land have their own private stills or beer- 
brewing apparatus. 

"In New York anyone with a friend and the 
price can obtain booze by the glass or in quantity. 



ENFORCEMENT 177 

The same is true of Chicago, St. Louis, Cincinnati, 
San Francisco — all of the larger cities. 

"Despite the Eighteenth Amendment there is 
more drunkenness in the United States to-day 
than ever before. Drinking is done in secret and 
surreptitiously, and yet the police blotters in nearly 
every city reveal an increase in the number of 
arrests for drunkenness. 

"In Philadelphia the police records show 300 
per cent, more arrests for intoxication from July 
1 to November 1 than for the same period last 
year and prior to the prohibition enactment. 

"Twenty million quarts of whisky entered the 
United States from Canada through Detroit alone, 
from January 1 to September 1 of this year." 

It is not to be wondered at that there are grave 
doubts as to the wisdom of the law. The stronger 
this feeling grows, the more difficult the enforcement 
problem becomes. 

What have the men whose duty it is to enforce 
prohibition to say on the subject? Mr. James F. 
Shevlin, supervising prohibition agent for the New 
York district, in a published statement was quoted as 
saying: "I say that prohibition is being enforced. 
If a man, in order to get a drink, is compelled to go 
after it by stealth and to pay enormous prices for 
the Vlrinks, isn't that prohibition?" That, Mr. 



178 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

Shevlin, is the prohibition of the bootlegger and his 
confederate, the corrupt politician, but it is not con- 
stitutional prohibition. Mr. Shevlin was transferred 
shortly after this statement was made. Mr. Frank 
L. Boyd, who succeeded him and who has since re- 
signed, described enforcement of the Volstead Act 
as "a thankless and a hopeless task." He has given 
some idea of the difficulties of enforcement in a 
statement which has appeared in the press : 

"We have two hundred enforcement officers in 
this state. The federal government's appropria- 
tion for enforcement of the Volstead Act is 
$5,000,000. We have twenty men to cover the 
St. Lawrence River front and another twenty to 
guard all of Lake Erie. It would take the entire 
First Division to begin to patrol this state's water 
front and end smuggling. We have one hundred 
and ten enforcement agents in New York City. 
There are something like 12,000 policemen in 
New York City, and yet they are not able to stop 
burglaries and robberies with the undivided sup- 
port of the city. Yet a hundred and ten men are 
trying to enforce the liquor law, which it appears 
most of the town does not care much for." 

Our own experience is similar to that of all coun- 
tries in which prohibition has been attempted. In 
China, it produced a nation of opium users. In 



ENFORCEMENT 179 

Sweden, nation-wide prohibition was abandoned, be- 
cause it was found that it resulted in home-distillation 
to such an extent that individual inebriety gave place 
to family drunkenness. Twenty-three years after 
Kansas went dry, Carrie Nation began her crusade 
against the saloons of that state. During the next 
four years she made a world-wide reputation as a 
reformer by wielding her hatchet in wrecking the 
barrooms of Kansas. 

Prohibition, under the Volstead Act, has followed 
a course which must have been foreseen by anyone 
familiar with the body's need for alcohol. We can- 
not doubt that present conditions were foreseen by 
the astute politicians of the medical ring. The more 
the scandal grows and the worse conditions become, 
the more disposed the people will be to insist on a 
modification of the law which will offer them some 
relief. As for the prohibitionist, if he cannot have 
a bone-dry country, he must accept modified prohi- 
bition as the next best thing. Such a plan has al- 
ready been suggested. It has been proposed that 
the government purchase all the remaining whisky 
stocks in the country at a cost variously estimated at 
from $100,000,000 to $500,000,000 of the people's 
money, and turn them over to the physicians to dis- 
pense. This might not end bootlegging or home- 
distillation. With the people in their present mood, 
and with the experience they have acquired, these 



180 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

could only be stopped ,at a cost which no nation 
could afford to pay in defiance of the wishes and 
resolute opposition of so many of its citizens. But 
the transaction would lower the price of whisky and 
increase the popularity, power and emoluments of 
the physician. 

Here is the plan as outlined in the press : 

a. That the Internal Revenue Department be 
given authority to establish, in all thickly pop- 
ulated districts, as many government stations as 
may be deemed necessary for the sale of spirits. 

b. That the spirits sold by such stations be pur- 
chased by the government, tested by the govern- 
ment, and be of a uniform quality. 

c. That such spirits be sold at a uniform price, 
sufficient to cover their cost and the cost of main- 
taining the stations, without profit to the govern- 
ment. 

d. That the Internal Revenue Department 
employ at such stations, at such salary as may be 
required to obtain them, one or more reputable 
physicians who shall have the authority and be 
under the duty to issue without charge prescrip- 
tions to anyone who may call at the stations and 
whom the physicians find to be in need of spirits 
or intoxicants for medicinal purposes. 



ENFORCEMENT 181 

e. That such stations shall also fill all pre- 
scriptions issued by physicians duly licensed. 

/. That any physician issuing a prescription 
for spirits shall immediately file a copy of it with 
the government station, so that the latter may at 
all times have a complete record of prescriptions 
and sales. 

g. That the physicians in attendance at the 
government stations shall have authority, after 
consultation and examination of the patient, to 
prescribe a quantity of spirits in excess of that now 
provided by law, if in their opinion such action is 
necessary. 

h. That in widely scattered rural districts 
where it would not be practicable for patients to 
travel long distances to a central station, prac- 
titioners be authorized to purchase from the gov- 
ernment at the nearest distributing station such 
spirits as they shall deem necessary for the needs 
of their patients, and shall be authorized to sell 
such spirits at the government fixed price, and 
shall be strictly accountable to the government 
station for all spirits received by them. 

This plan is hardly in accordance with the state- 
ment of the medical association that the use of 
alcohol in therapeutics has no scientific value. But, 
once the Volstead Act has been amended and the 



1 82 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

people have become accustomed to obtaining their 
whisky through the medical practitioner, there is no 
reason why the association should not bring their 
position on alcohol up to date. A little thing like 
consistency need not trouble them. 

Whether any such plan will be put into effect is 
more than doubtful. But there is no doubt whatever 
about the effect upon the public of certain features of 
the enforcement measures. Police officers have been 
ordered by their superiors to defy the law in order 
to enforce it — a curious paradox in the world's 
greatest democracy. The constitutional rights of 
citizens have been wilfully and flagrantly violated. 
Their homes have been invaded without warrants; 
their baggage has been seized and examined; they 
have been compelled to submit to offensive and de- 
grading personal search. And all this without a 
shadow of legal justification. But public opinion 
is beginning to make itself felt, and both federal and 
local authorities are responding. District attorneys, 
mayors and magistrates have in many instances done 
their clear duty and insisted that the law shall be 
decently observed by its paid defenders. Yet the 
real evil lies not in details, but at the very root of the 
whole matter. It is inherent in the Eighteenth 
Amendment itself, — a deliberate attempt under a 
constitutional mask to deprive the people of a nat- 
ural and therefore undoubtedly constitutional right. 



ENFORCEMENT 183 

After such a fundamental act of violence, political 
and legal rights must inevitably fall by the way. As 
United States Senator Borah said in August, 192 1 : 
"It has become almost impossible in certain cases to 
enforce the law without disregarding the Constitu- 
tion." The "certain cases" may be extended to all 
cases, for the spirit of the Constitution, if not the 
letter, has been violated by the amendment so un- 
scrupulously foisted upon it. Senator Brandegee 
said on the same occasion: "If this law cannot be 
enforced except by Russian and inquisitorial prac- 
tices, it is not a law for the Anglo-Saxon peoples." 

The American people will cordially endorse this 
statement of a self-evident truth. 

In the proceedings in the Senate with regard to the 
Willis-Campbell Bill (the Anti-Beer-Prescription 
Bill), during which the statements just quoted were 
made, an amendment was introduced (the Stanley 
Amendment) making it a felony for any govern- 
ment officer or agent, state or federal, or any other 
person, to search the persons or houses of the people 
without a warrant. Heavy penalties were provided 
for a violation of the clause. The Senate accepted 
the amendment. That may be regarded either as a 
simple or an extraordinary thing. In reality it is 
both. It is certainly a thing of the utmost and most 
obvious simplicity for a branch of the federal legisla- 
ture to safeguard the guaranteed constitutional 



1 84 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

rights of citizens. But it is an extraordinary thing 
that the wanton and contemptuous violation of the 
Fourth Amendment to the Constitution by the zeal- 
ous partisans of the Eighteenth Amendment should 
require a new clause in a new statute if it is to be 
coped with effectually. Affairs have come to a 
strange pass indeed when the machinery of govern- 
ment has to be restrained in this way from selecting 
which part of the Constitution it will enforce at any 
cost and by any means, and which part it will ignore. 
Press comment throughout the country showed a 
full appreciation of the gravity and yet grotesqueness 
of the issue. The New York World for August 1 1, 
1921, said in its leader: 

"What the Senate did was merely to revive in 
this connection the Fourth Federal Amendment, 
binding upon Congress and all officials of the 
national government, which reads : 

"The right of the people to be secure in their 
persons, houses, papers and effects, against un- 
reasonable searches and seizures, shall not be 
violated, and no warrants shall issue but upon 
probable cause, supported by oath or affirma- 
tion, and particularly describing the place to be 
searched, and the persons and things to be 
seized. 

"This article of the American Bill of Rights has 
been a part of the Constitution since 1791. It 



ENFORCEMENT 185 

was English law going back to a time before the 
American Revolution. It was not superseded or 
nullified by the Eighteenth Amendment, which 
seems to be the only part of the Constitution com- 
manding Mr. Volstead's recognition and respect." 

Mr. Volstead, characteristically, had expressed 
himself as being grieved at the new clause, which, 
if kept in the bill, would be "a big blow to prohi- 
bition enforcement." He was not grieved at all by 
any blows, however shattering, at the enforcement of 
the Constitution, which naturally seems to him a little 
thing in comparison with his own peculiar affairs. 
Perhaps, remembering that George Washington was 
called the Father of his Country, Mr. Volstead may 
desire to win the title of stepfather of a changeling. 

The New York Tribune said editorially on the 
same subject: 

"We are too close, perhaps, to what has been 
going on among us for the last eight years or so 
for the masses of the people to assess the enormity 
of the violations by public servants of the guaranty 
contained in the Fourth Amendment. 

"When historians of this age of 'The New Free- 
dom' come to cast up the record they will have 
occasion to marvel that a people for whom free- 
dom was purchased at such a cost should have 
drifted so far from their moorings as to be com- 



.186 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

pelled in the month of August, 192 1, to reassert 
by statute the right of personal liberty as guar- 
anteed in their Constitution." 

All this is merely one of the first fruits of prohi- 
bition, which is a deliberate attack not only upon our 
liberties, but, as I have endeavored to show in these 
pages, on the very foundations of our lives. 



CHAPTER XXII 

GOVERNMENT BY PROPAGANDA? 

There was a time, within the memory of many of 
us, when the American citizen was free to live his 
own life and seek his livelihood, unfettered by con- 
tinual government supervision. The administration 
of public affairs, so far as it affected the individual 
directly, was limited to certain necessary undertak- 
ings clearly defined by the Constitution, such as rais- 
ing the national revenues, coining money, administer- 
ing justice, maintaining a postal system and extending 
encouragement to the useful arts and sciences. 

The extension of government regulation had its 
beginning in the supervision of the business of our 
corporations. With the multiplication of govern- 
ment bureaus which an unwieldy system of taxation 
and other vicious measures have encouraged, a great 
network of surveillance has gradually been woven 
round our people, until it has now touched even the 
home life of the nation. The government bureau, 
instead of functioning for the common good, has 
fallen into the hands of special interests, which have 
used it to further their own ends. So far, these 
interests have been able to hold themselves beyond 

187 



1 88 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

the reach of the law. But prohibition has only been 
made possible through a gradual breaking down of 
our system of government. The adoption of the 
Eighteenth Amendment has now brought to the 
people a clear realization that their liberties are 
threatened. Whatever the outcome of the liquor 
controversy, they will not lose sight of the fact that 
the evils which have prepared the way for prohibition 
must be rooted out. 

Our system of government is supposed to be 
founded upon popular representation by geograph- 
ical division. When the Constitution was adopted it 
was contemplated that the people of the several 
states should be free to choose their own representa- 
tives. Upon questions of great national importance 
states might become grouped on one side or the other 
through the mutual sympathies of their peoples, and 
thus the feelings and opinions of the inhabitants of 
one state might influence the inhabitants of another. 
But that is not the case to-day. There are great 
organizations, sometimes nation-wide in their activi- 
ties and at other times operating in more or less 
important sections of the country, throwing their 
influence to suit their interest, first in one state, then 
in another, and defying the sovereignty of the people 
of those states. It may be a union of the employees 
of a transcontinental railroad, whose influence may 
be felt in any one of a chain of states extending from 



GOVERNMENT BY PROPAGANDA? 189 

the Atlantic to the Pacific ; or a miners' union, organ- 
ized throughout the coalfields of Ohio, Pennsylvania 
and West Virginia; or the Anti-Saloon League, an 
organization drawing its members from all parts of 
the country and leagued with many subsidiary organ- 
izations. These unions or societies are organiza- 
tions of private citizens, with no lawful political 
standing but with great political influence. The 
smaller the state in which they are operating the 
more this influence is felt. The states of the Union 
vary in population from Nevada, with about 120,- 
000 people, to New York, with over 10,000,000. 
Yet all states are on an equal footing when acting 
upon an amendment to the Constitution. That is a 
fact with which everybody is quite familiar, but 
everybody may not appreciate its significance. 

In putting through the Eighteenth Amendment, 
the Anti-Saloon League had the support and co- 
operation of the National Health bureaus, and 
these in turn were controlled by the medical union, 
an international organization. Thus, through secret 
combinations, even foreign influences were brought 
to bear in the making of our laws. This was ac- 
complished by the dissemination of propaganda, in 
the preparation of which the government bureaus 
participated. The Congress was intended to be a 
deliberating body. Are we to substitute govern- 
ment by propaganda for our original system? 



190 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

The success of the prohibition movement has em- 
boldened the propagandists. Other attacks upon 
our liberties have begun. It is not a case simply of 
an anti-tobacco crusade or some similar movement. 
There will be plenty of those. But our religious 
liberties themselves are to be assailed. The same 
methods are to be employed, according to a state- 
ment by one of the agitators : 

"We shall work in every congressional district 
in every state. We shall agitate and spread prop- 
aganda, and cause voters to write unceasingly to 
their Representative in Congress, until no Con- 
gressman who cares to stay in Congress will refuse 
to vote for our measures. These were the 
methods used by the Anti-Saloon League, and they 
were effective." 

It is high time these irresponsible organizations 
were brought within the control of the law. The 
proverb of the wolf in sheep's clothing is as full of 
meaning for us to-day at it was in the time of iEsop. 
We must recognize the fact that an undertaking 
which is begun in all sincerity may fall into the hands 
of the unscrupulous, and that high pretensions may 
be only a camouflage for sordid motives. If a move- 
ment is for the good of the people it will do no harm 
to know all about it in the beginning. If these 
organizations were required to incorporate and to 



GOVERNMENT BY PROPAGANDA? 191 

keep an accurate list of their members and contrib- 
utors, and the amounts contributed, the press of the 
country could be relied upon to do the rest. If it 
failed and harm should come, we should at least 
know whom to hold accountable. We should not be 
obliged to add to the burdens of the taxpayers in 
seeking out the names of the supporters of an illegal 
undertaking, as in the case of the parlor bolshevists. 
Prohibition has already done more harm in this 
country than bolshevism ever could do. There may 
come a time when we shall be seeking the names of 
our parlor prohibitionists. 



CHAPTER XXIII 

THE WAY OUT 

Prohibition has been adopted as a part of the 
fundamental law of the land. Every safeguard 
which the ingenuity of legal minds could devise has 
been placed around it. When we consider that it 
will be necessary to obtain the consent of the legisla- 
tures (or conventions) of three-fourths of the 
several states to undo what has been done, and that 
these bodies will be watched and influenced by the 
Anti-Saloon League, backed by a vast army of old 
and new profiteers and their political allies, the repeal 
of the Eighteenth Amendment seems all but impos- 
sible. Yet in spite of the strength of its legal posi- 
tion, there is a weakness in the very foundation of 
prohibition which it has been impossible to rectify. 
Once this is understood, it will require only a well- 
placed blow to bring the fabric so carefully erected 
crumbling down about the heads of its promoters. 
As is often the case, when the little minds of men are 
pitted against the purposes of nature, a temporary 
success has been seized only to make the final discom- 
fiture more complete. 

192 



THE WAY OUT 193 

The whole structure of prohibition rests upon the 
premise that alcohol is harmful — a habit-forming 
drug, a poison — and this conception is maintained by 
the government medical bureaus. When we remove 
the misguided, inefficient men from our national 
health departments and establish an honest and com- 
petent service, that service will tell us that alcohol is 
necessary, both as food and medicine, to sustain 
human life. The Eighteenth Amendment will then 
automatically become unconstitutional. No nation, 
especially one as large as the United States, can lay 
down hard and fast rules for the nourishment of its 
people, and survive. To extend governmental reg- 
ulation to the foods we eat (except in emergencies 
or to ensure pure products) would be contrary to all 
American principles and traditions. And not only 
would prohibition come to its unregretted end with 
the establishment of a sound national health service, 
but the way would be cleared for the eradication of 
disease, here and throughout the world — tuber- 
culosis, influenza, pneumonia and other infections. 
That these diseases still prevail is due to the power 
of an organization which so far has been able to' 
block all improvements in medical treatment, except 
those which it could control and so turn to profes- 
sional profit. Yet this organization has not been 
content with the disastrous influence it already exer- 
cises. As Dr. John P. Davin, of New York, says 



194 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

in a letter to the New York World of August n, 
192 1 : "For a long time the medical politicians who 
control the American Medical Association have 
aimed at a Cabinet position for one of their number 
in a Federal Department of Health." But it is 
natural that these "medical politicians" should aim 
at a Cabinet position to give them more leverage for 
their destructive efforts. Not long ago they were 
trying to place one of their organization in the 
White House itself. Fortunately, the White House 
can still stand for progressiveness, not reaction. 

Compare the position of medicine to-day with that 
of other sciences. Note some of the great achieve- 
ments of mankind in other fields of human endeavor. 
Consider only the most recent successes. Man is 
able to talk over a wire from New York to San 
Francisco and recognize his friend's voice. He has 
crossed the broad Atlantic through the air in little 
more than a single night. He has harnessed the air 
waves to carry the messages of his telegraph and 
telephone. He has preserved sound indestructibly 
on little discs, so that the great masters of music shall 
be indeed immortal and future ages shall still hear 
our Carusos and Paderewskis. Curative medicine, 
on the other hand, in spite of all we have learned 
about disease, stands almost exactly where it did at 
the beginning of the Christian era. Have you been 
led to believe otherwise, as the result of successful 



THE WAY OUT 195 

medical propaganda ? Then hear the truth from the 
medical text-books: 

"We have learned to prevent many diseases by 
the elimination of the corresponding infecting 
agents from our midst; cholera, plague, typhus 
fever, typhoid fever, yellow fever, smallpox, ma- 
laria and diphtheria are diseases which, if they still 
exist among civilized people, do so with the con- 
sent of the people in the face of a full knowledge 
of the manner of their prevention. 

"Wonderful progress has also been made in sur- 
gery. By its means countless lives have been 
saved which otherwise would have been doomed. 
But, after all, surgical treatment cannot be re- 
garded as curative treatment in the proper sense 
of the word; the surgeon may amputate a badly 
crushed limb or he may remove a diseased ap- 
pendix, or a cancerous breast, but he does not cure 
the limb, nor the appendix, nor does he restore the 
breast to its original condition. The final repair, 
the healing of the wound, is accomplished by the 
animal body itself. The surgeon, however, is 
frequently placed in a position where he can assist 
nature materially to accomplish a cure, and in 
this respect he is certainly more favorably placed 
than the internist. 

"The latter may be a most skilful diagnostician, 



196 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

an excellent pathologist perhaps, but he does not 
cure the diseases with which he is brought into 
contact. He may in a measure influence some 
diseases by his directions for the general care of 
the patient, but as a rule the patient dies or re- 
covers irrespective of his therapeutic efforts, in so 
far at least as these efforts are based upon ancient 
empiricism. Typhoid fever patients still pursue 
the same course which was so well described by 
the physicians of the mediaeval ages; our pneu- 
monia death rate is still what it was when the 
earliest records on the subject were kept, and is 
virtually the same for the millionaire in his marble 
palace, surrounded by doctors and nurses, as for 
the tramp who is cared for by the roadside by his 
brother tramps. The 'virulence' of an epidemic 
of scarlatina or measles may vary, but our death 
rate in the long run is virtually the same. Where 
actual progress has been made in the treatment of 
disease, such progress has been due not to our 
therapeutic interference by means of drugs, but to 
a recognition, be it ever so slight, of those factors 
by which nature herself, unaided and at the same 
time unhampered by empirical drug treatment, 
seeks to accomplish that end. For after all, the 
very thing which physicians have sought to ac- 
complish in all the centuries that have passed, viz., 
the cure of disease, that very thing nature has 



THE WAY OUT 197 

accomplished by herself, before our very eyes, 
countless millions of times. 

"Nature herself cures 75 per cent, of the pneu- 
monia cases, while the physician fails to cure any, 
for surely he cannot claim as his own what nature 
does, and he evidently loses the 25 per cent, that 
nature also loses."* 

Organized Medicine obtained its power as the 
result of the high pretensions of medical ethics — u the 
services it can render to humanity." Through this 
plea it has been able to consolidate the most powerful 
organization of modern times; an organization 
which would not be permitted to exist except for its 
avowed purpose, the advancement of science and the 
welfare of the human race. A British courtf has 
recently swept away the gloss and pretence surround- 
ing medical ethics, and they stand revealed as the 
private rules of an international association of in- 
dividuals who are letting themselves for hire — rules 
which have no foundation, in this country at least, 
in national laws and which are contrary to the spirit 
of the Constitution of the United States. 

The American branch of this association is organ- 

* "Infection and Immunity : A Text-Book of Immunology 
and Serology"; Simon, pp. 18, 19. 

t High Court of Justice, King's Bench Division. Pratt 
and Others vs. The British Medical Association and Others. 
(1919.) 1 K. B. 244. 



198 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

ized along the same lines as the Workmen's and 
Soldiers' Councils of Russia. Their governing body 
consists of delegates from constituent associations, 
scientific sections, and medical departments of the 
United States Government. While it is not per- 
mitted to the employees of the postal service to 
organize and send their delegates to the meetings of 
the American Federation of Labor, the Public 
Health Service and other medical departments of 
the government are privileged to send their repre- 
sentatives to the House of Delegates of the medical 
union because it poses as a scientific body. 

The association has also established connections 
with many of our great universities through their 
medical colleges. The medical college is, in a 
measure, independent of the control of the university 
trustees and subject to the rules of the medical as- 
sociation. It is, nevertheless, an integral part of the 
university and as such is entitled to all the prestige 
which the name can command. 

The endorsement and assistance which the associa- 
tion has thus, indirectly, been able to obtain from the 
government and the universities has been a great 
help to the organization in spreading its propaganda 
among the people, and in its conflict with the newer 
schools of medicine. But the most important and 
sinister exercise of its power has been in the use 
which the association 'has made of the university and 



THE WAY OUT 199 

other institutions to control the course of medical 
progress. 

Medicine is not a simple science where progress 
can be made along a given line. It embraces many 
subservient sciences — anatomy, physiology, pa- 
thology, bacteriology, chemistry, serology, etc. — one 
often specially dependent upon another. The very 
complexity of the science has laid it open to bureau- 
cratic exploitation. If something new in any of the 
subservient sciences was discovered which appeared 
to be against the interests of the association or which 
they were unable to control, it was a simple matter 
to refer it to one of the government bureaus, which 
promptly passed it on to a college or some other insti- 
tution, where it was pigeonholed. If the matter was 
ever called to public attention, the mere fact that the 
government and a great university had had the op- 
portunity to pass upon it and had dropped it was 
sufficient to condemn it in the public eye. Perhaps 
the reader will have a better understanding of the 
workings of the system if it is shown in operation. 

When the great influenza pandemic was taking its 
heavy toll from our population, there was a general 
discussion of the bacteriology of the disease. In- 
spired articles on the value of an influenza serum 
appeared in the newspapers, and bills were intro- 
duced into Congress to appropriate a large sum for 
the purpose of isolating the germ which was causing 



200 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

the havoc. Long before the infection reached 
America an accurate knowledge of the disease had 
been obtained through private experiments and an 
effective treatment perfected. These experiments 
had shown that serum was of little or no value in the 
treatment of this type of infection. Full information 
was laid before the government bureaus. In spite of 
this, the authorities went ahead with their plans for 
the production of a serum. Although it was entirely 
experimental, the serum was sold in large quantities 
throughout the country. After a year's trial it was 
pronounced worthless. If the serum had been a 
patent medicine, put out by a pharmaceutical house, 
its promoters would have been called to account. 
But it was a "scientific" effort and the unfortunates 
who died as a result of using a worthless remedial 
agent became victims to the advancement of 
"science." As for the other treatment, it was passed 
from one government bureau to another. It finally 
brought up in the Influenza Committee of the Public 
Health Service and was by them referred to the 
Harvard Medical School. That was the last heard 
of it. 

An American chemist discovered a process for the 
improvement of a well-known drug. This chemical 
was recognized by physicians throughout the world 
as a valuable treatment for pneumonia. Many of 
the drugs of the pharmacopoeia have been improved 



THE WAY OUT 201 

and refined from time to time. In this particular 
case, the form of the drug most used in America was 
manufactured under a process which had been dis- 
covered in a ,German laboratory. The American 
chemist's process was so far an improvement on the 
German that injurious constituents, amounting to 20 
per cent, which were present in the German product, 
were removed without detracting from the thera- 
peutic value of the finished product. The drug in 
its refined form was much more effective in its com- 
binations with other chemicals with which it was 
usually prescribed. 

The chemist took his product to the American 
Medical Association. He gave his formula. The 
parent drug was listed in the United States Pharma- 
copoeia and also known by its chemical symbols. To 
illustrate we will call it — 

A 6 B 2 (CD 4 )(NO)X 3 (YZ) 

The process removed certain poisons represented 
by, let us say, NO. The chemist's formula there- 
fore was — 

A 6 B 2 (CDJ (NO) X 3 (YZ) — (NO) 

or 

A 6 B 2 (CD 4 )X S (YZ) 

This did not satisfy the medical association. They 
demanded to know how the poisons, NO, were 
extracted. The chemist was in a quandary. If he 



202 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

made his process public, he would first have to patent 
it or surrender his only asset, which had cost him a 
small fortune and years of labor. His product 
would then become a patent medicine and subject to 
the virulent attack of all the medical journals con- 
trolled by the association. If he refused, although 
every chemical molecule in the refined drug was 
known, it became a secret medicine condemned by the 
ethics of the profession. After a protracted corre- 
spondence the process was refused. The association 
then published in its Journal 2l report condemning the 
product, and this was mailed to every one of its 
members. 

The Constitution of the United States provides 
(Article I, Section 8) — 

"The Congress shall have power — 
"To promote the progress of science and useful 
arts, by securing for limited times to authors and 
inventors the exclusive right to their respective 
writings and discoveries." 

So far as this concerns medicine, it has been made 
a mockery of by the medical union, as have also the 
pure food laws. 

But the chemist was not to be baffled. He had 
influential friends and he proceeded to introduce his 
product. The value of his discovery was confirmed 
by the splendid results obtained by independent physi- 



THE WAY OUT 203 

cians in their daily practice. When the United 
States entered the war, the new drug was offered to 
the government, not as so many profiteers were 
offering their wares, but at cost. But the govern- 
ment bureaucrats had been warned, and they refused 
the offer. The chemist persisted. It was politely 
suggested that he take the matter up with the Rocke- 
feller Institute. This he did, but it availed nothing. 
His experience at the institute would fill a chapter in 
itself. As a last resort, he determined to try what 
political influence would do. Two men, high in 
government circles, were approached, and they con- 
sented to help. Then, and only then, did the govern- 
ment bureaus become interested. They saw that 
they had a determined man to deal with, and they 
finally agreed to take the matter under advisement. 
The chemist was directed to send his product to the 
College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia Uni- 
versity, to be tested. There a worthless test and a 
worthless report were made, and that ended the mat- 
ter. It was a coincidence that the chemist had grad- 
uated years before from the same university's Col- 
lege of Pharmacy. 

Is it plain now how this system works? Any 
matter which might cause the association concern or 
make trouble for its agents in the government bu- 
reaus can always be disposed of by referring it to a 
reputable institution. And if someone in that insti- 



204 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

tution is "careless" or "inattentive to his duties" and 
makes a blunder, it in no way reflects on the officer 
of the government or his association. 

Do you think the mother in far off Kansas, when 
she received the War Department's telegram that 
her boy was down with pneumonia in a Texas camp, 
cared whether the medicine they were giving him 
was manufactured under a German patent or an 
American patent, whether it was ethical or unethical, 
as long as it was the best that science could produce? 
It was her boy's life she wanted; nothing else mat- 
tered to her. And the colonels of the medical corps, 
who have held their positions because they were will- 
ing to do their union's bidding, did they tell that 
mother that everything possible was being done for 
her boy, or did they tell her the truth, that no matter 
how her son fared, union rules must be observed? 
The Patent Office was established as much for the 
benefit of our people as for the protection of our 
authors and inventors. America is entitled to the 
best efforts of all her citizens, no matter who they are 
or what their calling. 

We have often cause to wonder at the wisdom of 
the farseeing statesmen who laid the foundations of 
our government. It is our good fortune that we 
have, in addition to our great state papers, a volu- 
minous record of the thoughts of these illustrious 
men. It seems as if almost every contingency which 



THE WAY OUT 205 

we have had to meet in recent years has been covered 
in their writings. It was the concentration of power 
in the federal bureaus which made prohibition pos- 
sible. Thomas Jefferson, in his first annual message 
to Congress, warned the people against these federal 
offices. 

u When we consider that this government is 
charged with the external and mutual relations 
only of these states; that the states themselves 
have principal care of our persons, our property, 
and our reputation, constituting the great field of 
human concerns ; we may well doubt whether our 
organization is not too complicated, too expensive ; 
whether offices and officers have not been multi- 
plied unnecessarily and sometimes injuriously to 
the service they were meant to promote."* 

At any rate, if we must have officials and bureaus, 
let us take good care that they are as efficient as 
possible. As soon as we have a national health 
service that is concerned wholly with the interests of 
the public, and not with those of any domineering 
professional association, the first great step in the 
cause of constitutional liberty will have been taken. 
For prohibition will end. 

* Thomas Jefferson. First Annual Message, December 8, 
1 801. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

CONCLUSION 

There is much to be learned, and not about 
alcohol alone, from the prohibition controversy. 
Nothing in recent years has brought us more squarely 
face to face with our shortcomings. We have held 
our form of government high among the democratic 
nations of the earth ; yet representative government 
is a failure when controlled by fanatical ignorance. 
There is no despotism worse than that of an ignorant 
democracy. 

The prohibition movement found us destitute of 
any real knowledge of alcohol. It found us ignorant 
or careless, in far too many instances, on the subject 
of natural laws, economics, and other fundamentals. 
It has shown us so ignorant of history, even that of 
our own country, that we have been unable to profit 
by the past experience of former generations of 
Americans. It is only human to err, but the success- 
ful man is the one who profits by experience and does 
not fall into the same mistake a second time. This 

is as true of a nation as of an individual. 

206 



CONCLUSION 207 

The history of prohibition goes back three thou- 
sand years. In our own country it goes back almost 
three hundred. Early American records show that 
in 1663 the Governor of Delaware prohibited distill- 
ing and brewing in that colony. From then until 
now prohibition has been agitated periodically in the 
United States. As with the perpetual motion 
machine and other interesting or irritating obses- 
sions, there has always been someone ready to ex- 
ploit the prohibition fallacy as soon as the public 
recovered from their last experience. Some- 
times it has been the professional reformer, looking 
for a little easy money; at others the visionary 
fanatic, too much impressed by the importance of his 
own idea, and too little interested in America to 
study her history. The usual crowd-elements have 
joined the movement, attracted by its presumed 
idealism, or the opportunities for profit, or the mere 
desire to be associated with agitation and action. 

Many of our most distinguished statesmen have 
gone on record against this class of legislation. 
Abraham Lincoln's statement, made in the contro- 
versy of 1840, is one of the notable examples. He 
said: 

"Prohibition will work great injury to the cause 
of temperance. It is a species of intemperance 
within itself, for it goes beyond the bounds of 



208 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

reason, in that it attempts to control a man's ap- 
petite by legislation and makes a crime out of 
things that are not crimes. A prohibition law 
strikes a blow at the very principles on which our 
government was founded."* 

There is a whole volume of scientific facts con- 
densed into these few words. 

Between 1851 and 1855 a substantial part of the 
United States adopted prohibition — the New Eng- 
land States, New York and Delaware or the Middle 
States, and Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa and Mich- 
igan of the Middle West, with the territory of 
Nebraska. These states contained about forty-eight 
per cent, of the population of the entire country. We 
need no stronger proof of the failure of prohibition 
as a temperance measure than the history of that 
period. 

Before this time, from 18 17 to 1850, there had 

been no tax on alcoholic liquors. Good whisky sold 

at wholesale at twenty-five cents a gallon. It was on 

sale in the groceries and other stores throughout the 

country. The whisky barrel on tap with the tin cup 

hanging beside it was a familiar sight in the country 

store. Under such conditions temperance is a virtue. 

And the American people made it so, for during the 

* Congressional Record, Sixty-third Congress, Third Ses- 
sion, p. 629. 



CONCLUSION 209 

system of free whisky the per capita consumption was 
gradually decreased. 

A great change came with prohibition. In 1850 
our population numbered 23,191,876 and the total 
consumption of spirits was 51*833,473 gallons. In 
i860 the population had increased 36 per cent, to 
31,443,321, while the total consumption of spirits, 
in spite of the prohibition enactments, increased 73 
per cent, to 89,968,651 gallons. During this period 
the consumption of wines also increased, while that 
of malt liquors was more than doubled. 

The failure of prohibition in the 'fifties has been 
attributed by the prohibitionists to lack of legal 
means of enforcement, and they have used it as an 
argument for constitutional prohibition. To prove 
the possibility of total abstinence they point to the 
Mohammedans, also to the North American Indians 
who had never used alcohol until the white man 
brought his firewater to this continent. They cite 
these cases as examples of peoples that have existed 
for generations without alcohol. The fact that a 
people have never used alcoholic liquor or have been 
able to give it up is not an argument for prohibi- 
tion. Let us look below the surface. Compare 
the industries of these people with our own great 
industrial development. Where were the brass fac- 
tories in Connecticut before the coming of the Eng- 
lish? How do the manufactures of Mohammedan 



210 THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT 

countries compare with those of Europe and Amer- 
ica? How does the business life of some of the 
Asiatic nations contrast with ours? The telegraph, 
the telephone, the typewriter, the adding machine 
and all the other labor-saving devices have been 
invented to simplify our business methods, but they 
have not lessened the burdens of our industrial work- 
ers. We have simply taken advantage of every 
time-saving invention to multiply our activities. Our 
corporations are larger, our enterprises greater and 
our fortunes more colossal. It is the life we are 
leading that has made prohibition impossible in 
America. If the nation really wants prohibition 
there is no reason why it should not have it, if it is 
ready to pay the price and suffer the penalties * — 
and providing we are willing to adopt the standard 

* Many of the plagues that have swept over the earth had 
their origin and acquired their virulence among the prohi- 
bition peoples of Asia, who have suffered far more from 
disease than the Western nations. Of course, other condi- 
tions must be considered, besides prohibition; but the facts 
are instructive. In spite of their leisurely, easy-going exist- 
ence, the average span of life among the inhabitants of India 
and China is only about half our own. Compared with the 
Western nation's average of from thirty-six to fifty-six years, 
we find an average lifetime in India of from nineteen to 
twenty-one years, and from twenty-two to twenty-five years 
in China. To illustrate their weakness when attacked by 
disease: in some prohibition countries the mortality from 
influenza during the great pandemic was over five times the 
American death rate. 



CONCLUSION 211 

of living of a prohibition people. But let us look 
squarely at our problem, with a full realization of 
what real prohibition will mean; for it is impossible 
to change a nation's whole mode of existence by 
the passage of one prohibitory law. 

There is no virtue in any controversy unless we 
seek the truth. And to this end, if we wish to have 
a better understanding of the whole subject of pro- 
hibition, we must first have a better understanding 
of alcohol itself — its uses and abuses. We must 
discard any false impressions acquired from passing 
observation of the drunkard of the saloon and set 
ourselves to learning the body's natural needs, not 
in the seclusion of the laboratory but in the every- 
day life of the American people. 



INDEX 



Adamson Law, 165 
Alcohol and auto-intoxication, 
78 sqq. 

— and efficiency, 67, 68 

— and fatigue, 113 sqq., 127 

— and golf, 119 sqq. 

— and grain conservation, 136 
sqq. 

— and immigration, 52 

— and insanity, 63, 64, 65 

— and longevity, 50, 51, 69 
sqq. 

— and religion, 13 sqq. 

— and suicide, 65, 66 

— as a medicine, 104 sqq. 

— as a restorative, compared 
with nature, 72, 73 

— as a stimulant, 105, 113, 
117, 118 

— food value of, 15, 46, 47, 97 
sqq., 133 

— traffic, mortality statistics, 
75, 76 

Alcoholic beverages, importation 
statistics, 143, 144, 145 

Alcoholism in New York and 
Brooklyn, 175, 176 

"Alcohol — Its Relation to Hu- 
man Efficiency and Lon- 
gevity," vii, 57, 58, 59, 60, 62, 

75, 137, 169 
American Federation of Labor, 

53, 134, 198 

American Medical Association, 
viii, 17, 18, 20, 22 sqq., 37, 
38, 43, 44, 46, 47, 48, 49, 

54, 55, 59, "2, 124, 194, 
201, 202 

A. M. A., Committee on Legis- 
lation, 47 



A. M. A., House of Delegates, 

39, 198 

— Journal, 202 

— Resolution condemning al- 
cohol, 39, 46, 47, 58 

Anderson, W. H., 57 
Antibodies, 35, 42, 43, 60, 109, 

no, III 
Anti-Saloon League, 56, 57, 154, 

173, 189, 192 
Appleton's Medical Dictionary, 

32 
Arnold, Dr. Alma C, 31, 95 
Aronovitch, Dr., 114 
Arrests for alcoholism in New 

York, 175 
Aschaffenberg, Dr., 67 
Auto-intoxication, 78 sqq. 

Behring, Dr., 23, 25 

Bell, Sir Robert, 33 

Bellevue Hospital, 176 

Bennett, Arnold, 123 

Borah, Senator, 183 

Bordet, Dr., 23 

Boston Medical and Surgical 

Journal, 83 
Boyd, Frank L., 177 
Brandegee, Senator, 183 
Bremer County case, 163 
Brewers' Board of Trade, 136 
British Medical Association, 197 
British Munition Workers' 

Health Committee, 127 
Bryan, Wm. J., 57 
Bureau of Animal Industry, 32 

Camp Whitman, 32 

Cana, 14 

Canadian Government, 34 



213 



214 



INDEX 



Carrel, Dr. A., 88 
Champagne, effect of, 60, 61 
Chemotherapy, 36 sqq. 
Cicero, 73 

Cider making, 90, 91 
Cincinnati City Hospital, 33 
Cincinnati Enquirer, 33 
Cleveland, house shortage in, 

133. 134 
Cobb, Irvin S., 170 
Columbia University, 146 

College of Physicians 

and Surgeons, 203 
Department of Physiol- 
ogy, 114 
Concentration camps, in, 128, 

129 
Congressional Record, 208 
Council of National Defence, 

Medical Section, in 
Currency inflation, 141 

"Darwinism and Race Prog- 
ress," 64 
Davin, Dr. John P., 65, 193 
Declaration of Independence, 46 
"De Senectute," 73 
Devonport, Lord, 127 
Diphtheria antitoxin, 25 
Douglas, Dr., 23 

East and West, contrasted, 209, 

210 
Ehrlich, Prof. Paul, 23, 35 sqq. 
Ehrlich's side-chain theory, $5 

sqq., 108 
Ethics, medical code of, 23, 

24 
Exchange depreciation, 141, 142 

Farmers' Bulletin, 32 
Fatigue and alcohol, 113 sqq. 

— and disease, 123 sqq. 

— toxins, 114 

Federal prohibition director, 

Illinois, 48 
Fees, medical, 40 
Fillinger, Dr., 60 
Fisher, Prof. Irving, 57 



Fisk, Dr. Eugene L., vii, viii, 13, 
58, 59, 60, 62, 65, 67, 73, 
75, 76, 78, 80, 136, 138, 169 

Foot and mouth disease, 32, 34 

Fourteenth Regiment, N. Y. N. 
G, 32 

Fourth Amendment, 184, 185 

Gallipoli, 33 

Georgia and the Anti-Saloon 

League, 56, 57 
Germicide, practical, 36 sqq., 

108, 109 
Golf and alcohol, 119 sqq. 
Gompers, Samuel, 134 
Grain conservation and alcohol, 

136 sqq. 
"Greenback" party, 140 

Hall, Prof., W. S., 85 

Hare, Dr., 106 

Harvard Medical School, 200 

Hippocrates, 26 

Hobson, R. P., 57, 147 

House of Commons, 33 

House of Representatives, Ap- 
propriations Committee, 17 

"Human Machine and Industrial 
Efficiency, The," 124 

Hunter, Arthur, 50 

Illinois, federal prohibition di- 
rector in, 48 

"Immortality of the Cells and 
Tissues," 89 

Imports of alcoholic beverages, 

143, 144, 145 
Indiana State Penitentiary, 172 
Infantile paralysis, 32 
Infection, explanation of, 42, 43 
"Infection and Immunity," 197 
Influenza Committee, Public 

Health Service, 200 
Influenza epidemic, in, 112, 

126, 157, 158 
Insanity and alcohol, 63, 64, 65 
Internal Revenue Department, 

180 
Iowa Supreme Court, 163 
Israelites, 14, 15 



INDEX 



215 



Jacobi, Dr. Abram, 80 
Jefferson, Thomas, 205 
Johnson, "Pussyfoot," 57 
Journal of A. M. A., 202 
Journal of Experimental Med- 
icine, 88 

Kings County Hospital, 176 

Labor unionism, 159 sqq. 
Law of Moses, 13, 14, 15 
Lee, Dr., 114, 124 
Leslie's Weekly, 176 
Life average in China, 210 

— in India, 210 
Life Extension Institute, 59 

Hygiene Reference Board, 

59, 62 
Life insurance companies, 17, 18, 

49, 50, 62, 68, 75, 169 
Lincoln, Abraham, 207 
Liquor trade mortality statis- 
tics, 75, 76 
Loyster, James A., 31 

Manchester weavers, 44 

Mayo, Dr. Charles H., 39 

"Medical Ethnology," 81 

Medical ethics, 23, 24 

Medical fees, 40 

Medical Record, N. Y., 81, 89 

Medical Section, Council of Na- 
tional Defence, in 

"Medical Student's Manual of 
Chemistry," 61 

Metchnikoff, Prof., 23, 78 

Moran, Wm. H., 171 

Mullan-Gage Act, 147 

Munition Workers' Health Com- 
mittee, British, 127 

Nain, 14 

Nation, Carrie, 179 

National Health Service, 189, 
198 

Nature's process of fertility re- 
newal, 72, 73 

Neo-Salvarsan, 37 

N. Y. Health Department, 32, 33 



N. Y. Herald, 31 

N. Y. Life Insurance Co., 50 

N. Y. Medical Record, 81, 89 

N. Y. Tribune, 185 

N. Y. World, 33, 65, 184, 194 

Nutrition Laboratory, Boston, 67 

Occupational hazards (alco- 
hol), 75 

Paget, Sir James, 124 
Paratyphoid fever, 32 
Pasteur, Dr., 22, 23 
Patent medicines, 26, 27, 28, 37, 

38 
Pfeiffer, Dr., 23 
Philippines, alcohol and U. S. 

troops, 81, 82 
Plumb plan, 161, 165 
Police court statistics, N. Y. 

City, 175 
"Practical Therapeutics," 106 
Pratt case, 197 
Prohibition and labor, 51, 52, 53, 

133, 134 

— cost of, 147, 154 

— history of, in U. S. A., 173 
sqq., 207, 208 

— in the South, 17, 56, 57 

— loss of revenue through, 
146 

Proverbs (quoted), 104 
Public Health Service, 189, 198 
Influenza Committee, 200 

Reid, G. Archdall, 64 
Religion and alcohol, 13 sqq. 
Rockefeller family, 18, 54 

— Institute, 54, 203 

— John D., 55 
Roosevelt, Theodore, 158 

St. Elizabeth's Hospital, Wash- 
ington, D. C, 63 
Saleeby, Dr. C. W, 139, 140 
Salvarsan, 37 
Save-a-Life League, 66 
Secret Service Bureau, 171 
Seligman, Prof. E. R. A., 146 



2l6 



INDEX 



Senate Finance Committee, 146 

Serum therapy, 23, 30 sqq. 

Shevlin, Jas. F., 177 

Simon, Dr., 197 

Sing Sing prison, 172 

Society for the Study of In- 
ebriety, 63 

Sorensen, Dr., 138 

Stamp Act, 174 

Standard Oil Co., 17, 54, 55 

Stanley Amendment, 183 

Stedman's Medical Dictionary, 
97 

Suicide and alcohol, 65, 66 

Supreme Court, Iowa, 163 
— U. S. A., 11, 46, 47, 112, 
149 



Training camps, 111, 128, 129 
"Triangle of Health, The," 31, 

95 . 
Typhoid fever, 32 



U. S. Army Reports, 32 

Vaccination, 31, 32, 33 
Volstead Act, 147, 171, 172, 178, 
179, 181 

— Committee, 57 

— Representative, 185 

Washington, George, 185 
Weichardt, Dr., 114 
Weigert's law of regeneration, 

no 
Weinberg, Dr., 60 
Wheeler, Wayne B., 57 
Whisky treatment in influenza 

cases, in, 112 
White, Dr. Wm. A., 63 
Willis-Campbell Bill, 183 
Wilson, Woodrow, 124, 125 
Witthaus, Dr., 61 
Women's Christian Temperance 

Union, 27 
Woodruff, Dr. Chas. E., 80, 81 
Wright, Dr., 23 



\9»* 



p.?* 



.LJBRARY OF CONGRESS 

lllllllllBI 
027 279 743 2 



